


Koi no yokan? Shouganai, na.

by signifying_nothing



Series: Words of Devotion [1]
Category: ATEEZ (Band)
Genre: Biting, Bleeding, Drug Use, Explicit Sexual Content, Full Feelings Nasty, Healing, Immortals, M/M, Magical Elements, Self-Indulgent, Suicidal Ideation, Supernatural Elements, Temporary Character Death, The Author Regrets Nothing, Trauma, Vampires, eventual ot8 - Freeform, kpop boys ensemble, so please forgive that chunk of pairings up there, soft vore?, temporary suicide, this will eventually have literally all the pairings, tragic backstories
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-03
Updated: 2020-06-12
Packaged: 2021-02-26 14:14:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 31
Words: 84,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23005909
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/signifying_nothing/pseuds/signifying_nothing
Summary: Kang Yeosang kills himself at 8:43pm on Saturday, December 19th.Kang Yeosang wakes up again at 2:56am on Sunday, December 20th.in which an immortal meets a vampire, and it all snowballs from there.
Relationships: Choi Jongho/Kang Yeosang, Choi San/Kang Yeosang, Choi San/Kim Hongjoong, Jeong Yunho/Kang Yeosang, Jeong Yunho/Kim Hongjoong, Jeong Yunho/Park Seonghwa, Jeong Yunho/Song Mingi, Jung Wooyoung/Kang Yeosang, OT8 - Relationship
Series: Words of Devotion [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1790611
Comments: 614
Kudos: 511





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Koi no Yokan: Japanese  
the act of seeing a person and knowing that you will inevitably fall in love.   
Shouganai, na: Japanese  
a feeling of, 'well, what can you do?'; confronting an inevitability. 
> 
> read the tags, pay attention to my chapter notes, as i try to warn for content there, as well.  
enjoy (ﾉ^ヮ^)ﾉ*:・ﾟ✧
> 
> this chapter contains: suicide, drug use, suicidal ideation, depression, and the "death" of a family member.

Kang Yeosang kills himself at 8:43pm on Saturday, December 19th.

Kang Yeosang wakes up again at 2:56am on Sunday, December 20th.

He's... Warm. That's weird. He shouldn't be... Shouldn't the water be cold by now? It wasn't even warm when he got into it, since he didn't want his blood to be flowing too fast. He'd wanted it to be a slow roll into death, not a speeding car crash.

...Wait.

Yeosang jerks up, gasping for air, coughing violently—coughing up water, oh god _bloody water—_all over the white bedsheets. White? His sheets aren't white, they're green, dark green, and this room is too big, the window is in the wrong place, shows a beautiful slice of skyline lights, it's so dark, where is he where is he _what happened?_

Yeosang is still coughing when there is a knock at the open doorframe. He gags a little, coughs up more. More bloody water. Oh god.

“Here,” comes a man's voice, low and soothing. “Here, get some fluid back in you. You look like hell frozen over.” Yeosang does _not _want to drink whatever the man is offering him. What the fuck is going on here? Where is he, he's supposed to be dead!

...Maybe he is dead.

Maybe... This is the afterlife. Waking up in some strange bed with a strange man forcing a cup to your mouth and holding your nose and tipping your head back so you're forced to swallow the... bright, cold, winter-tasting liquid.

“There,” the man says. “Is that better?”

Yeosang swallows, clutching his throat. His stomach is settling even as he sits there so he nods, because he has no idea what the hell else to do. The man hums.

“I am going to turn a lamp on.” There is a click to the side of the bed, and then there is light. Yeosang is still having a problem breathing, but it doesn't help that the man in front of him is... breathtaking. Older. Long hair, tied back into a tail. Little waves hang around his face, escaped from the elastic. His eyes are... Huge. Big and brown and heavy lidded. His mouth is somber, his chin and jaw strong. He's wearing a loose shirt with big sleeves and a pair of tight jeans. He is also reaching to touch Yeosang and Yeosang jerks back, irrationally—well, very rationally, actually—terrified. What the _fuck _is happening?

“What's happening,” Yeosang manages, through his raw throat.

“You died,” the man says. “You killed yourself last night, in your bathtub. With a very, _very _sharp kitchen knife.”

“....Yeah,” Yeosang says, squinting at the man. “And?”

“And,” the man looks... Tired. Worn out. As Yeosang looks at him, it seems he becomes more and more exhausted. “And you are alive now.”

“That's ridiculous,” Yeosang says.

“Of course it is,” the man says. “There are very few of us. You are extraordinarily lucky I happened to be in the country, so you didn't have to wake up alone in a bathtub full of your own blood and bowels.”

“What?!” Yeosang almost squeaks, and the man puts a hand to his own forehead, sighing.

“Let me start at the beginning,” he says. “My name is Lee Gunwoo.”

“Okay?” Yeosang says. “And?”

“And,” Gunwoo says, his expression very serious. “I was born in 920, in the Kingdom of Goryeo. Though I cannot... Recall what my name was then. I died the first time in 947, in an attempt to repel a Mongol attack.”

“What,” Yeosang says, because _clearly _this man is insane and he needs to get out of here as quickly as possible.

“When I woke up,” Gunwoo says, and his gaze is sad and distant. Yeosang, despite these insane circumstances, feels his heart ache a little. “Everyone else... Was dead. I feared going back to my general, that he would... Not believe me, when I told him I was killed, that he would assume I had somehow betrayed him. So I left. I met another man like myself deep in the Qilian mountains, in China. Much like you are meeting me now, Kang Yeosang.”

Yeosang wants to crawl out of his body. Everything feels wrong, he feels wrong, everything about this is insane, he wants to go home, he wants to go home—

_you don't have one of those though, do you. _

_you made sure you don't._

“No,” Yeosang shakes his head. “No, stop, this is insane.”

“If you go back now,” Gunwoo says. “You will walk into what investigators will decide is a murder scene. They will spend weeks, months perhaps, looking for your body. You will be pronounced dead. Your family will mourn you, if you have any family. Your friends, perhaps, if you have those. But you cannot stay there, Kang Yeosang. You do not know what to do to protect yourself. You're too young, too new.”

“What are you talking about,” Yeosang asks, feeling that he's crying and having no idea why. “Why can't I go home?”

“Because the world warps around us, Kang Yeosang.”

Yeosang looks at Gunwoo. Gunwoo looks... Ragged. Beyond exhausted. Old, despite the youthfulness of his face.

“We are those that stay still in the water of time. We do not... We do not age, we do not die. We must have had a purpose, once, but none I have met know what that purpose is. Every attempt I have made to die has been unsuccessful in the last thousand years or so and I have tried so, so many times, Yeosang. But the empires rise and fall around us and we remain.”

“You...” Yeosang trails off, feeling something cold and heavy settle in his gut. “You're serious. You really think you're an immortal or something.”

“Would you like to kill me?” Gunwoo asks, reaching into the bedside table and withdrawing a short, slightly curved knife. “Or should I kill myself for you.”

“You—I can't—that's—”

“Cover yourself.”

Yeosang watches, in stuttering horror, as Gunwoo moves back on the bed, on the end of it, and yanks the knife from one side of his throat to the other. There is... Blood there's so much blood and it's spraying everywhere and Yeosang screams, screams and dives under the blankets as they're splattered with red and shakes because this isn't real, this isn't real, this isn't _real_.

But when Yeosang feels hot wet on his ankle, he peeks out from behind the blanket and there is Gunwoo, eyes half open, blood in his barely open mouth, dribbling down the side of his face. He looks like he's... Sleeping. If his eyes were closed, he could be sleeping. But he's dead. Oh god, Yeosang just watched a man kill himself, he needs to get out of here—

And then Gunwoo groans, the blood spilling from his lips down his neck and shirt. He wipes at his face with his sleeve but only manages to smear the mess everywhere. Then he looks at Yeosang.

_Into _Yeosang.

And... Yeosang knows in his heart he's not being lied to. That this man, Lee Gunwoo, was born in the Goryeo dynasty, that he was killed by mongols. That he's been alive ever since and now he's here, because Yeosang is like him. Yeosang is going to live forever, just like this miserable, miserable man in front of him, who has lived for a thousand years and can't remember his name.

“No,” Yeosang shakes his head. “No, no I don't—I don't want this I—I want to go home, I need—” but Yeosang can't think_. _He can't... He—this is wrong, he—“I need to go home,” he says, looking at Gunwoo who is looking at him with a sympathy so rich and deep and painful it makes Yeosang start to cry, really cry.

“I need to go home,” Yeosang says, and he's... Shaking all over, shaking, shaking. Then he is wrapped in a clean blanket, drawn into Gunwoo's arms. Gunwoo's chin rests on his head, his hands are warm. His blood is still warm and wet on his neck and on his shirt. “I don't want this, I don't want this, I don't...”

“None of us do, my dove,” Gunwoo says, rocking Yeosang back and forth, back and forth, a comforting, swaying embrace. “None of us ask for this. I will help you, I swear. In any way that I can, I will help you. I will not have you muddling through this alone as I did. I am not capable of that kind of cruelty.”

All Yeosang can do is cry, and cry, and cry.

When he wakes again, he is clean and the sheets are clean, Gunwoo is clean where he lays on his side on top of the covers, his hair loose and dark on the pillow. His body is silhouetted by the sun coming in through the windows. Yeosang wakes up enough to remember what happened last night and feels his eyes well in fear and helplessness. He tries to cover his mouth, to hide his twisting face, to be quiet, but Gunwoo might not have been sleeping.

“Hush, my dove,” he says, hugging Yeosang to his chest, smoothing a hand through his hair. “It is all right to cry.”

With that permission given, Yeosang cries even more. Loud and ugly and embarrassing. He feels frightened and stupid and small. But Gunwoo's hand in his hair, rubbing circles into his back, makes him feel safe despite the circumstances. When Yeosang is done making an idiot of himself, he wipes at his nose with his sleeve and whispers,

“I'm scared.”

“Of course you are, my dove,” Gunwoo says, kissing the top of his head before sitting up. “And that is acceptable and valid. When you are ready, there will be a meal downstairs. Please, help yourself to anything you find here, clothes, the bathing room. I will be in the kitchen.” Then Gunwoo climbs off the bed, giving Yeosang one last kiss to the temple like he's Yeosang's mom or something, and leaves the room.

Yeosang lets himself cry for a little while more, feeling even more stupid and pathetic and terrified, but he gets up. He finds the bathroom and uses the facilities, takes a shower. Is glad that there isn't a bathtub. He washes his hair, his face, brushes his teeth with a packaged toothbrush he finds under the sink. When he goes back into the bedroom, he opens one of the closets very slowly, afraid something might jump out at him. Nothing does. But the clothes inside are all... Old. They'll fit him but...

He picks out a white shirt like the one Gunwoo was wearing, and a pair of light, tight jeans. Upon looking at the label, Yeosang finds they're women's jeans. He pulls them on over a pair of clean briefs anyway. He makes his way downstairs and is surprised to see Gunwoo... Well, where he said he'd be, in the kitchen, hair tied back now, making rice and eggs and vegetables. When Yeosang enters, Gunwoo turns and looks at him, smiling a little. But even Gunwoo's smile looks like a sad expression. Like it takes everything in him to keep it on. It's hitched up at the sides, which is why it falls away as soon as he's no longer looking at Yeosang.

“Eat,” Gunwoo puts a plate in front of Yeosang fifteen minutes later. It looks like something out of a professional kitchen. At Yeosang's stare, Gunwoo shrugs. “I've had a lot of time to learn.”

Gunwoo's quiet sadness remains through the weeks, then months, then years, that Yeosang stays with him. Gunwoo started documenting his life after his fifth decade, and Yeosang has spent a lot of time reading over those texts. Gunwoo's writing says that he started to forget his name after trying to return to a previous life. That when he came back to Korea after traveling through the rest of Asia, his name wasn't on the family registry. As though he'd never existed and of course, there was no one alive to confirm his existence. Almost immediately, Gunwoo had started to forget.

_...like my mind no longer has the space for the memories, and so gets rid of them as though they are ruined, unreadable paper. I must remind myself of this name I have chosen often._

Yeosang reads through Gunwoo's documents ravenously, desperate to understand what's happening, desperate to know why _him. _But there doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason as to why. There's no way to track why it was him. Gunwoo has written down the stories of handful of immortals he's met, and none of them have anything in common except waking up again.

So Yeosang reads the many lives Gunwoo has lived, escaping each life when it became clear that he'd been too young for too long. Always a 'murder,' always his body never found, except once. Gunwoo had been actually murdered, and he'd woken up in a coffin. Had apparently screamed and screamed and screamed. Had died of suffocation several times before a witch (Yeosang isn't at all surprised to learn that they exist) heard him and dug him up. Had drawn Gunwoo back from a madness that had him killing himself very few days using any method he had at his disposal. Just to be sure he couldn't die.

He couldn't. Yeosang can't either. He's tried.

Gunwoo has written of all the immortals he's met, written their names and ages and stories. They were all in various states of being, all trapped, all with no way idea of why they were alive.

Gunwoo wrote of his love affair with a man named Kang Insoo, in the twenties. How he'd stayed with Insoo, told him his secret because he loved him desperately and didn't want to leave him. How he'd held Insoo's hand as he died an old man while Gunwoo, never changing, wept himself to exhaustion.

He wrote of how he'd dug Insoo's grave with his bare hands near that house in the mountains where they had lived together, safely hidden from the rest of the world. How that home is still hidden, and he visits on occasion.

Gunwoo wrote more fantastically about his drug addictions, his consumption of anything that could make him forget himself. How he had died of alcohol poisoning, of overdosing, by performing acts of foolishness while under the influence of drugs that made him feel invincible, instead of just unkillable.

Gunwoo still smokes opium, with the pipe he's had for hundreds of years, given to him by that same Chinese immortal, who apparently had seemed to find it a funny sort of joke. Gunwoo had been assured that he would need the pipe one day.

Yeosang watches, heartbroken and a little disgusted as Gunwoo subjects himself over and over to all opium has to offer. Watches and listens to him speak of the people he's met, the places he's been, the lives he's lived as he stares at nothing but smiles sweetly, just a little. Yeosang hears, over and over, Gunwoo apologizing that Yeosang is going to be subjected to this terrible, terrible life—facing down the great maw of eternity and never quite reaching it, as every other being does.

Yeosang watches, terrified, as Gunwoo tears apart his room, screaming and holding his head, breaking his furniture. As he throws himself against the walls, rips at his own skin and hair as though he is desperate to crawl out of his own body. Watches Gunwoo weep in the center of all that mess, and fears that in a few centuries it will be him in there on his knees, clutching himself and wailing like a wounded child.

Listens to Gunwoo quietly apologizing for asking Yeosang to stay, because he can't face it alone anymore, because being alone has destroyed him, and he doesn't want Yeosang to succumb to this madness that ruins him. _No one deserves this, _Gunwoo says thickly, watching his wounds close, staring at the disaster area around him as tears fall down his face. _No one deserves the agony of living forever._

Then one day, nearly seven years after Yeosang had woken up on that early Saturday morning, Yeosang goes to Gunwoo's room to lay with him as he often does, because Gunwoo's fits are few and far between, and Yeosang likes the comfort of his presence and heartbeat and warm arms.

But Gunwoo doesn't wake to hug him.

No matter how Yeosang shakes him, asks him, begs him, then screams and cries Gunwoo does not wake. He lays there, warm and alive and body stirring slightly on occasion and does not wake.

After two weeks of this, of Gunwoo's still body and reading desperately through Gunwoo's records trying to find some reason for his sudden sleep, all Yeosang finds that might help is in a more recent journal—a contact number for a witch who had procured some chemicals for Gunwoo, named 'Jung Taekwoon.'

So he calls. No one answers. Yeosang leaves a message, trying not to sound too frantic as he explains that there's something wrong with Lee Gunwoo, he needed help and if Jung Taekwoon could come as soon as possible, please.

It takes another two weeks. Yeosang lays beside his father figure, his friend, not caring to eat and worried literally sick. Literally to death.

Then there is a knock at the door. Yeosang drags himself up, stumbles to the front door of the house he and Gunwoo moved to when Yeosang couldn't stay in the city, and with all the strength he can muster, opens the door. He's malnourished and dehydrated. He's going to die any second now, he can feel it.

“Kang Yeosang?” The man asks. He's beautiful, painfully so.

“I'm Jung Taekwoon. You called?”

“I,” Yoesang manages, voice rough and scraping as he crumples to the floor and dies.

He wakes up a while later—the more physically traumatic the death, the longer it takes him to wake up, which Gunwoo says is normal—tucked into bed with Gunwoo as Jung Taekwoon looks Gunwoo over. He doesn't look particularly... Witchy, Yeosang thinks, his mind fuzzy around the edges.

“Are you always that dramatic?” Jung Taekwoon asks, cocking a dark eyebrow at him. “Or is it not common for you to die of starvation.”

“I,” Yeosang manages, trying to swallow and finding his throat painfully dry. He touches it, trying to look around. He tries to sit up and fails.

“Stay down,” Jung Taekwoon says, as someone else puts a straw in his mouth. “I've given you a sedative. I don't need you going into hysterics.”

Yeosang wants to protest, to say that he would never go into hysterics, but then again considering the phone call he'd left, maybe he might. So he sips liquid through the straw, not caring that it's tepid. It tastes like summer flowers, like the scent of grass and sunlight. His entire body feels instantly less withered.

“Sorry,” he says, swallowing a little more of the liquid—the potion, he assumes—before it's moved away from his mouth and strong hands are lifting him with an arm behind his shoulders and a hand under his head to put a few pillows beneath his torso, so he can see what's going on. “I don't usually... Just. I've been so worried.”

“Mmm,” Jung Taejwoon says, putting on hand over Gunwoo's bare chest and the other on the back of his head, lifting him. His neck is limp and Yeosang is terrified.

“What's wrong with him,” he whispers, terrified. Jung Taekwoon sighs.

“This isn't uncommon,” he says. His voice is warm and calm. Gone is his clipped, somewhat sarcastic tone. “What _is _uncommon is that he's lasted this long without it happening sooner.”

“What do you mean,” Yeosang asks. “What's uncommon, what's wrong?”

“Nothing's wrong,” Jung Taekwoon says. “He's sleeping. It's the _type _of sleep that worries you. This is a normal phenomenon among immortals. It's a recuperation sleep, it happens to all of them, but it's usually once every couple of centuries, not... Once every _thousand _years. It's incredible that he's lasted so long going without it.”

“What is that?” Yeosang wants to scream, he wants to scream forever. What is he supposed to do without Gunwoo, who has been his only consistent companion for almost a decade? The only person who has kept him from falling into a depression he can't crawl out of, who has cared for him when he just lays limp for days at a time, blinking up at the ceiling and not really seeing it? “When is he gonna wake up?”

“I'm not sure,” Jung Taekwoon says. “For some, it's a matter of weeks, for others, it's years. Sometimes decades. And judging by his bookkeeping,” he looks around the bedroom. Gunwoo's journals are all a mess from Yeosang tearing through them.

“He's long overdue.”

“He... He sometimes has fits,” Yeosang whispers, swallowing hard. “He... Goes into this kind of... Madness and he locks himself somewhere and I can't help him, he won't let me. Not till afterward.”

“That's because his body was trying to force him into the Sleep,” Jung Taekwoon says. “If he just powered through the fits, instead of collapsing into the Sleep at the end, then that explains why he _hasn't _done it yet. Most immortals...” Jung Taekwoon trails off, pursing his lips. “They don't have a will strong enough to last so long.”

“What...” Yeosang asks, tears finally sliding down his face because Gunwoo isn't going to wake up? He's not going to wake up, not for weeks, maybe years, maybe _decades? _How is Yeosang supposed to do this without him? How is he supposed to survive on his own?

“What am I supposed to do?”

Jung Taekwoon looks at him with great softness. Great kindness. He reaches across the bed and cups Yeosang's cheek. “There's nothing you _can _do, Yeosang. He needs the Sleep, he will stay asleep until... Until his body decides it's time to wake up. It's meant to protect their psyches. It's meant to keep them from being alive so long that they start to crumble. Some of them never experience it, if they find a task that brings them the motivation to stay alive. But if they don't have that, then...” Jung Taekwoon sighs.

“I suppose that taking care of you finally pushed him to his limits. It's not your fault. Like I said, he's long overdue. But you have to go without him for now. You cannot sit here and wait for him because it will drive you insane, no matter how much you want to help. No matter how much you want to stay.”

Yeosang squeezes his eyes closed and feels Jung Taekwoon's warm thumb wipe away his tears. “I made him like that? I did that? I—” Guilt chokes him. Closes his throat, squeezes his stomach.

“Do not despair,” Jung Taekwoon soothes. His voice so high, and sweet like a song. “He will wake, Yeosang. He will. When it's time.”

“I can't,” Yeosang shakes his head because it's as much as he can move. “I can't, I can't do this, I need him, I need him, please.” he feels pathetic, and lost, and small. He can't stop crying. “Please, please I _need _him.”

“I'm sorry,” Jung Taekwoon says. “I'm sorry, Yeosang.”

Yeosang cries himself back to sleep, just as he feels someone pull his mostly numb body from the bed. He tries to reach out for Gunwoo, and can't even twitch his fingers.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is the end of our 'prologue;'  
i promise things pick up from here.  
the first 5 to 7 chapters will come quickly, as they're mostly edited, though i can't say the same for the rest of them, please forgive me
> 
> no strong warnings for this one. enjoy!

Yeosang wakes in an unfamiliar room. The bed is comfortable but the blankets are heavy and when he pushes them off, he finds that the sun is shining in through a large window, and his body feels like air, and Gunwoo is not beside him.

Yeosang hauls himself from the bed and immediately drops to the ground, weak legs trembling. His arms are shaking, and he's so hungry. He's so hungry, and thirsty, and he can't even reach to get himself back on the bed, just collapses further to the ground oh shit, does he have to wait to die like this? It took _two weeks _for him to die like this—

The door to the room opens and a handsome man with dark hair is walking in. He's wearing jeans and a t-shirt beneath an elegant black cardigan that is jarringly ill-matched. He picks Yeosang up like he's made of sticks and puts him back on the bed.

“Jeeze,” he says. “Really had to rush out, did ya? Couldn't even wait for me to get upstairs?”

“Where am I,” Yeosang says. “Who are you.”

“You sure are polite,” the man says, rolling his eyes as he tucks Yeosang back under the blankets, leaving the top duvet off at Yeosang's tiny whine and kick of protest. One of his eyes is a bright, electric red. “I'm Wonsik. Kim Wonsik. You're at Jung Taekwoon's Coven.”

Right. Right, Yeosang had... Had called Taekwoon, he'd come and... Checked on Gun—

“Where's Gunwoo,” he says, heart speeding. “Where is he—”

“Calm _down, _kid,” Wonsik says. “Don't give yourself a fucking heart attack. He's in one of the downstairs chambers, he's still sleeping. Taekwoon said he's going to be sleeping for a long time.”

“No,” Yeosang says, struggling to get up. “No, I need to see him, I—”

“What you _need,_” Wonsik says, shoving Yeosang back down with ease. “Is to stay in bed until we can get some food in you. It's been four days, and before that you were literally starving for like, a month. Stay in bed.”

“But—”

“No buts,” Wonsik says. “If I come back here and you're trying to get out of that bed so help me I'll bend you over my knee and fucking spank you like the kid you are.” Yeosang can't decide what's worse. The threat or being called a kid. He's not a kid. He was twenty when he died, and he's twenty-seven now. Technically. Gunwoo had always celebrated Yeosang's birthday with a gift and slice of cake. _You should enjoy your birthdays now,_ he'd said, smiling kindly.

So when Wonsik leaves, Yeosang remains in the bed. He's not numb anymore, just... So weak, now that he's aware of it. He can barely move his hands. His stomach is cramping terribly, and he can feel his body withering in on itself. He's never died this way before. He swallows, tries not to be sick and breathes deeply when Wonsik comes back, holding a thermos.

He wants to ask what's in it, but doesn't. Just opens his mouth when Wonsik presses the little top cup to his lips. Even if Wonsik _does _poison him, it's not like he won't just wake up again. So he swallows the—soup, he'd figured it was soup—a mild vegetable broth with some kind of seasoning in it? Something spicy.

He lets Wonsik feed him three cups of the soup before he moves his head away. “How long am I going to be here,” he asks, feeling warm all over.

“As long as it takes for you to heal up,” Wonsik says. He looks uncomfortable, like he isn't used to doing this kind of thing. Comforting someone. “Long enough for you to... Figure out the details of how you're gonna exist on your own for a while.”

“I can't,” Yeosang whispers.

“You don't want to,” Wonsik corrects. Yeosang glares at him as much as he can. Wonsik sighs.

“It's not like I don't get it, kid. I went a long time without Hakyeon and Taekwoon. A really long time, I know it hurts. But you have to do it. You gotta learn how to exist with no one but yourself. You're all you got, for now.”

Yeosang feels that choke on his throat again. “I don't know how,” he admits, licking his lips, biting the bottom one, trying not to cry. God he's cried so much. It's pathetic.

“We ain't gonna just throw you out on your ass, Yeosang,” Wonsik says. “You've got some time to learn. Witches live, fuck, I dunno, anywhere between a hundred and fifty to four hundred years, depending on their own magic and how well their Coven works together. We can help you. I promise we ain't gonna let you go out there fuckin' clueless.”

Wonsik reaches out and ruffles Yeosang's hair. He's let it grow long over the last seven years. It's still wavy, dark. Little black almost-curls falling around his face and shoulders. Wonsik has the decency to tuck the waves back behind Yeosang's ear. “Come downstairs, when you're feeling better. Drink more of the soup if you can manage it. It's everfull, and it'll stay hot.”

Yeosang nods, doesn't protest when Wonsik tucks him in. He does already feel better, his stomach no longer trying to force bile up his throat. So he lays there, falls asleep. Wakes up, manages to shakily pour himself a cup of soup and equally shakily bring it to his mouth to sip it. Sleeps again.

Wakes up to a tanned man with red hair and one brilliant blue eye stroking his hair and looking... Pensive. Sad.

“Who're you,” Yeosang manages, too tired to protest the fingers on his scalp.

“Cha Hakyeon,” he says with no hesitation, just like Wonsik had. “How are you feeling, Yeosang.”

“Like shit,” Yeosang says, trying to sit up and grudgingly grateful for Hakyeon's help. “Why do I still feel like shit.”

“Well, you put your body through some pretty traumatic stuff,” Hakyeon says. “So there's that. Even _if _you can't actually die, if you damage your organs enough it can take a while to recover. Is the soup helping?”

“I guess,” Yeosang says, already exhausted just by the effort of sitting up. “I... I'm tired.”

“I can understand that.”

Yeosang swallows, staring out at the blankets. “I'm scared.” He looks at Hakyeon, who has the same tender smile on his face that Taekwoon did.

“I know,” he says, pushing back Yeosang's sweaty hair. God, Yeosang feels _disgusting. _His skin feels sticky, his hair limp and oily. When's the last time he took a shower?

“I wanna take a shower,” he says. Hakyeon hums.

“I'm sure you do. But I'm not sure you're strong enough to do that yet.”

“I can,” Yeosang says. Now that he's aware of how filthy he feels, he will get in a fucking shower if it _kills him. _Literally. “I can. Please. I feel—” Yeosang swallows, shuddering.

“I feel so fucking dirty.” It's been a long time since he swore so much. Gunwoo never swore, and so Yeosang had fallen out of the habit.

Hakyeon looks at Yeosang for a long time and then nods, standing up. “Come on. If you can get your feet on the floor I'll get you in the shower.”

It takes longer than he wants it to, but Yeosang manages to get his feet on the floor. He feels like all of his joints are made of toothpicks and sponge. But true to his word Hakyeon takes Yeosang by the elbows and walks him across the room, letting him take his own steps, keeping him from falling. His grip is firm but his hands are gentle, and Yeosang nearly collapses to the toilet cover once they reach the bathroom, winded. After walking the twelve feet from the bed. Pathetic.

Hakyeon turns on the hot water, checks the temperature with his fingers, then helps Yeosang get undressed. Yeosang would be embarrassed, but he caught sight of himself in the mirror and personally thinks he looks like one of those kids in the, 'starving children in Africa' advertisements that sometimes popped up on his computer. He'd turned his head away before he could gaze too long, and he lets Hakyeon get him under the water. It feels... So good. There's a bench, and Hakyeon sits him on it.

“I'm going to change the sheets,” he says. “If you can, the soap is here, shampoo and conditioner too.”

Hakyeon leaves, closing the shower curtain, and Yeosang just... Drops his head, licking his lips and trying to let the water wash away all of the terrible, terrible things he's feeling. Fear, anxiety. Anger, despair. How... How is he supposed to live without Gunwoo? He's been the constant in Yeosang's life, his friend, his support. What does he do, now that he doesn't have that?

_You gotta learn how to exist with no one but yourself. You're all you got, for now._

Yeosang wants to be sick. Swallows it down and pants for air, so long that the next time he opens his eyes Hakyeon has come back and is crouching to look up at Yeosang, his clothes soaked.

“Hey,” he says. “Hey, it's okay. It's okay. You can come back now.”

Yeosang hadn't realized he was gone, but he can't remember how long it's been since he sat down.

“There you are,” Hakyeon says. He smiles. “You're all cleaned up, so we're gonna get you dry and back to bed.” Yeosang can't remember even washing himself. Maybe he hadn't. Hakyeon's clothes are wet. Maybe he washed Yeosang clean.

“Okay,” Yeosang says, too tired to fight. Hakyeon turns off the water and gets Yeosang up. Wraps him in a towel, blow-dries his hair. Gets him into a set of pajamas, back into bed and feeds him a few more cups of soup before urging him to lay down.

“Go back to sleep, Yeosang,” he says, so gently. “Sleep.”

And he does sleep. For what feels like a thousand years Yeosang sleeps, wakes up long enough to be fed more soup, goes back to sleep. Finally, one obnoxiously sunny afternoon, Yeosang is sitting up when Wonsik comes in. Wonsik gives this annoying little smirk and Yeosang kind of wants to hit him. But Wonsik offers out his arm and Yeosang walks to it. He's not staggering, but he's definitely not as balanced as he usually is, he can feel that. Wonsik leads him down a set of stairs to a kitchen and dining room that look big enough to not only fit but feed fifty people. He sits Yeosang down in a chair at one of the tables and turns to the stove.

“What'll you have,” he asks, like this is a restaurant or something.

“Um,” Yeosang blinks. “I. Grilled cheese.”

“You want soup too?”

“I... I guess, yeah.”

Wonsik smiles and sets to work. It's clear he knows what he's doing behind the gasline stovetop, doing what looks like four billion things at once until he's setting a bowl and a plate on the table in front of Yeosang. The bowl is huge. There are _three _grilled cheese sandwiches.

“There's ham in them,” Wonsik says. “You need the fucking protein. IV drips are only gonna get you so far.”

“IV drips?” Yeosang asks, looking down at his hands and yes, sure enough, there are little bruises on the top of his left hand, the one that had been facing outward, towards the door instead of the wall.

“You were asleep for about six days after Hakyeon got you in the shower. Musta been some kinda magic trick, you slept better than you had since you got here. Woke you up for soup, you passed right back out.”

“How... How long has it been?” Yeosang asks, carefully lifting one of the sandwiches. It's been cut in half, like he's a kid.

“'Bout eleven days total,” Wonsik says, sitting down with his own soup and sandwiches. “S'pretty good, for someone as fucked up as you were.”

Yeosang nods, but it seems like the second the sandwich touches his lips he remembers how _ravenous _he is and he eats everything Wonsik gave him. Even all the soup. Wonsik looks pleased, though, and brings him some plain bread and butter.

“Can't have you making yourself sick. Not when you're finally recovered.”

Yeosang nods, his mind racing. He's here, at Taekwoon's... Coven? Gunwoo is downstairs, he's probably still sleeping. “Can I see Gunwoo?”

Wonsik sighs, shakes his head. “Taekwoon says it's not a good idea. You were really dependent on him, and it might reverse your recovery.”

“But—”

“No buts,” Wonsik says, his voice very gentle. “Think of it like a drug addiction, Yeosang. You had to quit cold turkey because he finally went into the Sleep, but luckily you've been asleep for most of the worst of it. I'm really sorry,” Wonsik says, and even though he sounds sincere, Yeosang doesn't believe him. Feels himself starting to cry already and god, is he _ever _going to run out of tears?

“I'm really sorry, kiddo. I know it hurts.”

“Fuck you,” Yeosang says, hating that his voice shakes, hating that he's crying. Hating that he has to keep wiping his face, hating how much it _hurts _that they're—they're keeping him away from the one person he cares about the most—

Worse is that Yeosang knows, intellectually, that Wonsik is right. It is like quitting a drug. He'd been alone with Gunwoo for so long. He hadn't interacted with anyone else except clerks at various stores and the occasional stranger at a bus stop or in a library. He knew it was... Not bad, just. Not good, either. And it wasn't like Gunwoo had kept him from doing those things. He'd encouraged him, actually. Urged Yeosang to make conversation, to maybe make a few friends.

But the thought of losing them—thinking about Gunwoo's journal entries about Kang Insoo—was enough to frighten Yeosang away from the idea. No, no making friends meant losing them. Meant leaving them behind when he and Gunwoo had to leave as they had planned to, shortly. A decade was about as long as Gunwoo stayed anywhere. He had a rotation of homes he went through. Eight or ten. He was going to take Yeosang to New York for a few years. Yeosang has always wanted to see New York. It will be hard to see it without Gunwoo there. But he can. He can do it. He's not a child.

Yeosang takes a few hard, shaking breaths.

“Okay,” he says, hating himself. “Okay. I. I want to go. I want to leave.”

“Not sure that's a great idea, kid,” Wonsik says. “You're still pretty new at this—”

“Gunwoo has an apartment in New York,” Yeosang says. “He—he got me a passport. Papers. Everything to prove that I was born there. I have... I have bank accounts, and he has an apartment there. I'm his brother in New York,” he says, smiling, trying not to cry even more. “So it's... It's just a matter of saying that he's de—” Yeosang swallows. He can't even say it. “Passed away. Easy.”

“Taekwoon has to give you the okay,” Wonsik says, after a very long moment. “But I'm gonna give you my support on that. He'll probably want to check on you every few years, make sure you're doin' all right. He'll wanna know where you are so when Gunwoo wakes up—”

Yeosang's heart leaps at _when, _not _if. _

“—he'll know where to find you.”

Yeosang nods, because that's fair. It'll... It'll be nice, having someone check up on him to make sure he's okay. Make sure he's not going crazy or anything.

“That's fair,” he says, licking his lips and sighing. “It means I have to go back to the house. Pack my suitcase, get my papers.”

“Taekwoon'll go with you to do that,” Wonsik says. “If he says it's okay.”

A few days later, after several meals and seemingly endless talking with three of them, Taekwoon says it's okay.

He looks Yeosang over, as though he's looking _inside _of him. Yeosang notices that he has one blue eye, and one red one. They start out very dark, and then seem to crackle and brighten until they match Hakyeon and Wonsik. He stares at Yeosang for an uncomfortable amount of time and then finally nods, very carefully.

“I think that's a good idea, Yeosang. It will help you more than hinder you.”

Yeosang isn't sure what that's supposed to mean, but he's glad that Taekwoon lets him go back to the house. Glad that he waits outside while Yeosang puts his suitcase and backpack together, doesn't say anything about how Yeosang has taken Gunwoo's most recent journal—the one with only a few pages written on—and stuffed it into his backpack.

Yeosang is glad that Taekwoon lets him go to the airport on his own, even if Hakyeon feels the need to kiss Yeosang's head and Wonsik pulls him into a one armed hug first. Hakyeon tells Yeosang to take care of himself, Wonsik tells him to remember to eat, because he's too skinny.

Taekwoon just looks at him with those dark, unreadable eyes and reaches out to cup his face the same way he did when they first met.

“I hope you find what you need there,” he says. Yeosang, again, doesn't know what that means, but he nods anyway and climbs into the taxi. Makes it to the airport and through security and all the way to the gates before his eyes get wet and he opens up the journal to look at Gunwoo's beautiful writing on the left page. It's flowing and elegant because he's had time to perfect his technique. Yeosang's handwriting looks like an elementary student's, terrible, tight chicken scratch as he dates the right hand page, unwilling to start just beneath his mentor's script. But he starts his entry the way Gunwoo always has, because it feels comforting to write the words, as though he gets to take a piece of Gunwoo with him.

> _It is April 21st, 2017. _
> 
> _Here starts the record of Kang Yeosang, in his twentieth year,_
> 
> _and his seventh year past his first life's ending._


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a vampire is met! flesh is eaten!  
(here's that soft vore tag, guys)

> _It is April 25th, 2017._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang,_
> 
> _aged twenty years and seven after._
> 
> _I have arrived safely in New York._

It takes Yeosang a few days to leave the apartment. It just feels so much like Gunwoo. It feels like home, with the muted earth tones interrupted by cream, spotted with darker jewel colors—deep reds and sapphires, greens and plums. He allows himself to stay in the master bedroom even though there are two more bedrooms, because this one has a big window overlooking the city, and a large bathroom. Yeosang has long gotten over his feelings about bathtubs. Besides that, the other bathroom only has a shower.

But when he finally does leave the apartment, he's glad that Gunwoo had been teaching him languages he needed to know, because all of the English he's hearing would be totally alien, otherwise. He's glad he'd been learning to speak Mandarin, even though he can't read it, and while he's slow to speak both languages, no one seems to care.

He's come to a Chinese grocer, because he doesn't think an American store will have what he needs. He purchases enough food to last him for a few weeks, because he doesn't like being out here, with all the noise and lights and people. Yeosang has _never _been fond of people, really, so it's not surprising that this place, this particular city, makes his head hurt.

He hails a cab to take him home, not caring about the cost. Gunwoo is, effectively, a silent and unknown billionaire, and puts money into bank accounts as he sees fit. The account he'd given Yeosang had half a million dollars in it, with five thousand put in at the beginning of every month, automatically. Yeosang has _no idea _what he's supposed to do with that amount of money. No clue. He doesn't really need material things. He has the laptop Gunwoo bought him for his birthday, he's never been much of a clothes horse. He's only feeding one, and the bills for the apartment are all paid automatically. He can afford to take a cab home.

But he can't stay locked up in the apartment forever with no company, it's going to drive him absolutely insane, so Yeosang takes to wandering the city. He tentatively takes in the noise and the mess and the smells. He tries gourmet chocolate in a chocolate bar, and an underground Chinese eatery that only does _actual _traditional Chinese food. He tries hotdogs at stands and Indian restaurants, a vegan Thai place that has the _best _curry Yeosang has ever eaten. He slowly, very slowly, lets himself fall in love with this place. With this mess and its colors and its people and its food and its magic.

He lets himself get pick-pocketed in Times Square a few times, false wallets that have about fifty dollars cash in them. He lets himself get mugged a few times—dies once, when one of his attackers slams him too hard against a wall. Unpleasant, but it's not that big a deal.

Before Yeosang realizes, two and a half years have passed and it's summer, late August. It's been too hot to go out during the day so he's been walking at night, listening to all the after dark sounds of the clubs and bars and strip-joints. The late-night eateries, the 24-hour diners. He loves it all.

But on this night in late August, two and a half years after Yeosang arrived in New York, something happens. Something bad.

He's just walking back to his apartment. He'd had dinner at his favorite diner where the fifty-year old waitress—Rosalia—calls him Yo-Yo and always gives him a extra fries because she thinks he's cute, and he always tips well because she's just such good company.

He's just walking back from his apartment when someone slams into him from behind. Hard enough to knock him over. Yeosang's head cracks against the pavement hard enough to make his vision spotty, and he's dragged by his lightweight jacket down a dark alleyway. He's too disoriented to know what's going on, but he knows—feels, in his gut—that this isn't just a mugging. This is different, this is—this is _bad, _and Yeosang, no matter how much he struggles, can't get away from whoever's holding him.

“Stop,” he slurs, repeating it in every language he knows, now including Spanish because he'd wanted to be able to talk to Rosalia in her native tongue. She'd been delightedto help him learn. “Stop, wait, what—”

Yeosang is shoved against a brick wall. He can't see any light anywhere, like he's underground, or in a tunnel, and whoever is holding him is—is physically smaller than him, but infinitely stronger.

“Stop,” Yeosang whispers, as one of his attacker's hands push his head down towards one shoulder. Yeosang barely has time to register what's happening before he is bitten, savagely. It hurts, oh god it hurts_, _and Yeosang shoves uselessly at the smaller body in front of his own, panting and unable to yell because whatever this thing is, it's bitten through his vocal cords. It's bitten through his neck, ripped out the flesh. It's biting into his collar, his shoulder, and his collarbone snaps under the force of its teeth. Yeosang feels his heart start to stutter, hiccup, slow.

Finally stop.

And, as always, it starts again.

Yeosang wakes up to the quiet sobbing of someone... near him. He feels achey but not particularly bad, maybe a little sensitive around the new skin and muscles and healed bones. Then he remembers that he was attacked by some kind of crazy cannibaland as he jerks up into a sitting position, hauling in an alarmed gasp of air, the crying turns into a frightened yelp.

Shouldn't Yeosang be the one yelping here?

Instead he groans, rubbing at his shoulder, neck and chest, where it _does_ still hurt. It must have been a lot of damage, then. But the voice near him has disappeared completely, changed into quiet, quivering breathing. Yeosang turns to find the source of the noise and sees...

A boy.

A young, obviously terrified boy with blood—Yeosang's blood—all over his mouth, chin and throat. He's staring at Yeosang like _he's _the one who just took a bite out of a complete stranger.

“You...” the boy starts. “You're alive.”

“In a manner of speaking,” Yeosang says, still rubbing his throat.

“I. I killed you.”

“Yes.”

“But... But you were _dead._”

“You're very bright, aren't you.” Yeosang gets up, brushes himself off. Mourns his shirt, which is ruined but at least his jacket is black. A few washes and it will be good as new. Or, well. As new as it had been when he'd thrifted it.

“I'm sorry,” the boy says, crying. The tears are strangely dark on his face, collecting under his eyes and sliding down his cheeks, which are gaunt, though they seem like they should be round with youth. He looks so _young. _“I'm—I'm sorry, I didn't mean to—I mean I—”

“You didn't mean to kill me?” Yeosang asks. “It certainly felt like you did.”

“I didn't mean to!” the boy sobs into his hands, visibly terrified and confused, and Yeosang feels a little stone of pity drop into his chest. He'd been something like this when Gunwoo woke him, after all.

“Hey,” Yeosang says. “Hey, look, it's okay. I'm okay, you're okay. Everyone's fine.” He looks at the kid for a long moment, and reaches to push back his hair. The kid flinches away, ducking his head.

“I'm sorry,” he whimpers into his palms and Yeosang takes a deep, deep breath.

“Come on,” he says. “Come on, get up. Come with me.”

The kid looks like he can't believe what Yeosang just said and frankly Yeosang can't believe it either, but he's started to be able to... Sense magic? Since he came to New York. He's found other 'otherworldly entities' this way. Witches, ghosts, that kind of thing. There is magic coming off this kid, now that Yeosang is actually paying attention. So Yeosang offers his hand.

“Come on. I live near here.”

The kid swallows, wipes at his eyes with his hands and tries to get the blood off of them using his ragged, zippered black hoodie. He stands, and Yeosang notices that he looks _rough, _dirty with stains and his clothes worn out. The kid takes Yeosang's hand. His fingers are clammy, cold, and shaking—but as Yeosang gently pulls him along his grip gets tighter. Like a little kid getting scared of a crowd and following his mom.

Yeosang takes the back entrance into his building, brings the kid up the back elevator. Leads him into the apartment and the kid still doesn't let go of his hand. In closed air, the kid smells like old blood, poverty, and magic.

“So. What are you?”

In his following of magical 'threads' as he's taken to calling them, Yeosang has met a lot of magical people, some of them are even Gunwoo's old contacts in the city, who are surprised to learn of his state and sympathetic to Yeosang's plight of not really knowing what he's doing. And this kid, now that Yeosang's really getting a good look at him, a good _feel _for him as it were, is practically _pulsing _magic. So much, and so powerful, that Yeosang feels like his veins are buzzing.

“Are you some kind of vampire or something?” Because those _did _exist, apparently. Along with werewolves and faeries and all the mythical monsters Yeosang's ever heard of.

“I,” the kid starts. “I don't know, I—I woke up and–and I was so hungry, but everything made me throw up and—and then—” His eyes are filling with tears again. Yeosang notes, a little disgusted, that they're made of blood instead of saltwater. Then he feels a deep sting of pity. This kid, this... Obviously terrified kid, had woken up with no idea of what was happening to him or rather, what _had _happened to him. Yeosang doesn't know much about vampires, but he does know they're the result of some kind of magic, as the kid in front of him is proving.

As much as he wants to remain indifferent, it's difficult when the kid is just... hiccuping, rubbing at his eyes with his dark sleeves. Yeosang remembers, as distant as it feels, waking up in that bed in Gunwoo's house and being so, so afraid.

_No one deserves the agony of living forever._

Yeosang licks his lips. Knows this idea is stupid, and knows he's going to do it, anyway. No one can ever claim that he's the brightest bulb in the box.

“Well. Lets get you cleaned up first. I have some clothes that should fit. Shoes off, I'll show you to the bathroom.”

The kid sniffles but bends to do as he's told, and Yeosang is grateful for that. At least the kid isn't fighting him on it. His boots are worn down, the soles almost gone, and he pulls off his socks, too. It's strange that the kid doesn't smell like sweat at all. Maybe cannibal vampires don't sweat.

Yeosang gets the kid into the smaller bathroom. Shows him where everything is, and grabs a change of clothes—soft sweatpants, a worn t-shirt and cardigan. It's not like Yeosang ever has guests or anything, and he's glad his clothes will fit the shorter, but definitely more muscular, young man.

“You get cleaned up. I'll stick your clothes in the washer.” The kid hesitates and Yeosang rolls his eyes. “You don't have to worry I'm gonna molest you or something, c'mon, hand them over.”

He does, flushing. Yeosang nods towards the shower. “Go on.”

Once the door is closed, Yeosang gives a small huff. Puts the clothes in the washer—including the socks—and grabs his cell phone to call Lee Hongbin.

Lee Hongbin is one of Gunwoo's old contacts. An extremely powerful Eclectic witch, who knows about ninety million random things, so maybe he'll know what to do with a cannibal vampire? Yeosang is just glad he picks up, considering the hour.

Though that doesn't mean he's happy about it.

“Why are you calling me at two in the morning, Kang Yeosang.”

“I have a cannibal vampire in my shower,” Yeosang says, point-blank, because how do you explain that kind of thing? “He killed me by taking chunks out of my throat, was crying like a small child after, so I brought him home. He's extremely distressed and has no idea what he's doing or what happened to him and frankly, I don't either.” Hongbin is vocally silent for a period of time. Yeosang can hear the rustling of cloth, the rifling of paper, the clicking of computer keys. Hongbin's been working on making his knowledge digital. It's apparently quite a process.

“Okay, so.” Hongbin starts. “You probably _do _have an actual cannibal vampire or, since you said he was upset, he was sired and then left alone.”

“What,” Yeosang asks, feeling his heart squeeze. “Left _alone?_”

“Yeah,” Hongbin says. “Newborn vampires, if they're not taken care of by their sire for the first few months, can get really bloodthirsty. Really _hungry. _That's how they end up going on a killing spree and getting taken down by a Hunter or a witch or something. And if they haven't been fed long enough they start needing the flesh, instead of just the blood. A lot of those attacks look like animal attacks, which is how people cover it up.”

“Oh,” Yeosang says, swallowing. “All right. All right, that was all I needed Hongbin, thank you.”

“Are you planning on keeping him?”

“...The vampire?”

“Yeah,” Hongbin says. “I mean, since he can feed on you without having to worry about killing anyone.”

...Now there's a thought.

“We'll see,” Yeosang says. “Depends on how obnoxious he is, I guess.”

“Let me know,” Hongbin says. “I've got some charms that'll make it easier for him to exist. Complete light resistance, a more human appearance, that kind of thing.”

“How much is that gonna cost me,” Yeosang smiles.

“You can afford it,” Hongbin says, his own sharp grin audible. “Let me know how it goes, either way.”

“I will.”

Hongbin hangs up before Yeosang can. Yeosang is left to stand in the kitchen, cell phone on the counter. He thinks about what Taekwoon said, when Gunwoo fell into the healing Sleep.

_Some of them never experience it, if they find a task that brings them the motivation to stay alive._

He can feed this kid. He can feed this kid, and no one gets hurt. No one dies.

_This is a bad idea, _he thinks, but as the kid—clean now, damp hair and dark eyes and hunched shoulders—silently steps into the kitchen, Yeosang decides he'll at least give it a try. He should at least do the most he can. Because it's what Gunwoo had done for him, and so he can do it for someone else.

“Hey,” Yeosang says. “What's your name.”

“Jongho,” he says, his voice very, very quiet. “Jongho Choi.”

“Okay. I'm Kang Yeosang. I need you to tell me some things. Are you up to that right now?” Jongho nods, his arms across his chest, hands fisted in the material of the cardigan.

“Come sit down.” Yeosang brings Jongho to the 'living room' which is actually just an open space attached to the kitchen. The entire apartment, save the bedrooms and bathroom, are open plan, and a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows to the front of it all. Yeosang sits on a chair, and Jongho sits in a corner of the couch, all curled in on himself like he's trying to be even smaller than he already is.

“How long have you been like this?” Yeosang asks.

“What... What day is it?” Jongho asks.

“August eighth,” Yeosang says.

“Seriously?” Jongho's eyes are very wide.

“Yes.”

“It's um. It's been three months.”

“Okay,” Yeosang nods. “When did you realize something was wrong.”

“When I couldn't—couldn't go outside. I thought I was just getting really intense sunburn at first, but the longer I stayed out the worse it got, and... I mean, I woke up in a parking lot the night before, I made it home, but.” Jongho swallows hard. “I figured I had to have been bitten by a vampire, right? Even though vampires don't exist,” Jongho's eyes are welling up with tears again.

“Except obviously they exist and obviously I'd been turned into one by the guy I'd been with the night before. Everything I tried to eat made me sick, I kept—kept hearing heartbeats and there were _so many _of them, and I. I ran, I didn't know what else to do, I didn't... I didn't want to hurt anyone.” Jongho rubs at his eye with one hand, visibly trying to make sure he doesn't get blood on the cardigan.

“I thought maybe if I came to a different city I might be able to find someone who could help. Someone who knew what I was supposed to do. But I can't remember how I got here, I can't... I don't know if I killed anyone on my way here, or if biting into myself was enough was enough to...” He sniffs. “I think. I think I probably did.

“Next thing I know I'm, I'm taking bites out of _you_, literal bites, and I was so scared, I didn't mean to kill anyone, I didn't want to, I just wanted someone to help me, I'm—I'm so scared.” He looks miserable and pathetic, sitting on the couch across from Yeosang, curled up to be as small as possible.

“I can't live like this,” Jongho whispers, and Yeosang's heart _aches. _“I can't live like this, I'd rather die, I'd rather die than have to—to _kill people._”

“Well,” Yeosang says, moving to the couch and stopping when Jongho throws out his hands, pushing himself into the armrest.

“Don't, don't get too close to me, I don't—”

“You can't kill me,” Yeosang says. “I am, very literally, unkillable.” Jongho stares at him in confusion.

“Why?”

“I'm not sure,” Yeosang says, honestly. “But I'm immortal, Jongho. So if... If you're hungry. I'll feed you. I promise you won't kill me, I _swear _you won't. Just try not to make a mess on my carpets, okay? They belong to my... My mentor, and I'm sure he wouldn't be pleased if we got blood on his Persian rugs.”

“How do you know you won't die this time?” Jongho whispers.

“I have tried to kill myself with _every _method in the book,” Yeosang says. “You _literally _took bites out of me. You're not going to kill me. Now come on,” Yeosang gets up. “I don't want to do this out here, since there might be arterial spray. Better done in the bathroom.” He offers Jongho his hand and once again Jongho takes it like a small child needing guidance. Yeosang leads him through the master bedroom and into the master bathroom, where the tub is sitting, unreasonably huge and deep, sitting on a short platform and surrounded by a clear plastic curtain.

“Get undressed.”

“Wh—why?”

“Because I don't want you getting blood on my clothes,” Yeosang says, peeling off his own dirty shirt and jacket, wiggling out of his skinny jeans, leaving himself in high-end brand briefs, one of his few monetary indulgences. Jongho is blushing furiously, and Yeosang laughs. “C'mon, Jongho. You don't have to be embarrassed. We can leave our underwear on if that makes you feel better.”

Apparently it does, because Jongho gets undressed and follows Yeosang to the tub. He has at least a dozen bitemarks on his forearms, some of them older, some of them new, and all of them are ugly. Another stab of sympathy pushes through Yeosang's gut. He's been biting himself then, maybe... Recycling what little blood he has? Does that even work? He'll have to ask Hongbin.

“We're gonna let it fill,” Yeosang says like he's making normal conversation, like he's not going to let this boy kill him via blood loss. And maybe flesh loss. “Since I don't want to wake up in a cold tub. That's just uncomfortable.” Jongho still looks doubtful, but Yeosang reaches to ruffle his hair. It's thick, a little too long, black. He's a cute kid, now that he's cleaned up. Too skinny, but maybe more feeding will change that.

Eventually the tub is halfway full and Yeosang climbs in. It's big enough to fit about five people, honestly—more like a hot tub than an actual bath—but that's working to his advantage right now. Jongho hesitantly climbs in, crawls over Yeosang's body to sit in his lap, on top of his folded legs. There's nothing sexual about it—Jongho looks like a little kid, wanting to be coddled and held.

“Take your time,” Yeosang says, easily tipping his head back against the porcelain. He feels Jongho holding his shoulders, using his nose to push Yeosang's jaw over to one side. He feels Jongho's breathing, even though vampires supposedly don't to need to breathe. He feels the tip of Jongho's tongue touch his neck in little pokes until he finds what Yeosang assumes is an artery.

Yeosang feels teeth, smells floral shampoo, smells listerine and almost wants to laugh but then there is a bright, electrifying pain. He jerks a little, surprised, but he tries not to cry out. It hurts, it hurts it hurts and then—then it doesn't. He can feel that Jongho is still biting him, can feel his teeth still sunk brutally into Yeosang's neck, can feel warm blood trickling down his chest when the flow is too much for Jongho to swallow. He can hear Jongho's choking tears as he tries to swallow, holding on tight to Yeosang with one arm under Yeosang's to hold his shoulder, the other holding the back of his neck.

“Shh,” Yeosang breaths, bringing his weak arms up to hold Jongho around the waist, lacing his fingers so his grip doesn't fall once he's dead. “Shh, Jongho, it's okay, it's okay I promise I'll be fine. I'll be fine.”

Jongho sobs a little but doesn't stop. He's starving, Yeosang remembers. Probably hasn't fed properly in all the months since he became what he is.

Yeosang's getting cold despite the warmth of the bath, his heart is pulsing, trying to keep blood flowing when there is no blood to push through his system.

“It's okay,” Yeosang whispers, wondering if this is how Gunwoo felt, holding Yeosang as he wept every time he woke up again from yet another suicide attempt. “It's okay, Jongho, I'm here. I'm here. It's okay.” His vision gets too spotty to see through. His lips won't open. So Yeosang just holds on to Jongho, his head slowly tipping back over the side of the tub. Yeosang listens to his own heart beat slow, slow, slow, then stop.

He wakes again, just as he promised he would. Yeosang takes in a deep breath, and feels that Jongho is holding his hand, his forehead pressed into Yeosang's shoulder, his voice a tiny little chant.

“Please, please please wake up, Yeosang please wake up—”

Yeosang squeezes Jongho's hand and looks over at him, smiling. He feels weak, but that's normal. It's not like he's going to wake from death and be ready to run a marathon or something.

“You woke up,” Jongho says, and he's crying, but his mouth is curved into a smile, a beautiful, boyish smile even with his fangs, top and bottom, showing. He's crying and he's smiling and he's laughing and it's so beautiful, Yeosang thinks, that he's able to give Jongho this. To give him this simple but so important gift.

“Told you,” Yeosang says, smiling, reclining in the tub. The water is still warm, though it's pink. “Drain and refill the tub,” he says, nodding towards the shelf on the side wall. “Pick one of those. Salts, bath bomb, I don't care.”

Jongho, again, does as he's told. Yeosang lays in the tub for the rest of the evening, encouraging Jongho to refill it, drop in something scented, something he likes, every time. Jongho kills him twice more, and cries both times, holding Yeosang's hand. When they're both very pruny and Yeosang is too exhausted to stay awake, Jongho climbs out of the tub and peels off his wet briefs, grabbing a towel to wrap around himself. He lifts Yeosang out of the tub—as though he weighs nothing—sits him on the counter to get _his _briefs off, and wraps him in a towel, too. He towels off their hair, and Yeosang laughs when Jongho brings him to the master bedroom to tuck him into the sheets.

“You're sweet, Jongho,” he assures, ruffling Jongho's hair. “Don't forget to close the curtains. The front ones, the dark ones.” There are two sets—one light and gauzy, the other straight black-out for when he doesn't want to wake up.

“Can... Can I stay with you?” Jongho asks after he's done what Yeosang told him to, lips pressed together and eyes darting anxiously over Yosang's face. Yeosang nods, his head heavy. It's been a long time since he's slept beside someone. Not since Gunwoo.

“Of course,” he sighs out, not protesting when Jongho climbs into the bed. He wiggles close and puts his head against the left side of Yeosang's chest. Yeosang's arm is bent up near his head anyway, and he slowly starts to drift off, hearing Jongho breathing even though he doesn't have to.

He's falling asleep and feels Jongho reaching for his right hand, threading their fingers together across his belly.

“Thank you,” he whispers, so soft Yeosang almost doesn't hear it. “Thank you thank you so much.”

Yeosang doesn't have the energy to say 'you're welcome.' Instead he turns his head and lets his lips press into Jongho's dark, damp hair.

> _It is August 9th, 2020._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang,_
> 
> _aged twenty years and ten after._
> 
> _Today, I took in a vampire. _
> 
> _His name is Jongho._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so how do we feel about jongho, hm?  
different to his last appearance in my stuff, right? ^^  
you can find me on the bird app!  
@iwriteausins


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> explicit content warning! there is some sex (kind of. i tried not to be graphic but still. sex.)  
and!! enjoy the double update. i think these chapters had to be posted together so people didn't get, mm... the wrong idea? i guess?   
either way, enjoy!

> _It is July 1st, 2021._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang,_
> 
> _aged twenty years and eleven after._
> 
> _Jung Taekwoon has contacted me; no change in my mentor's state._
> 
> _Jongho is still with me, and grows more every day._

Jongho is blossoming into a beautiful young man, Yeosang thinks with a tinge of pride. He's so much happier than he was last year in August, when he'd killed Yeosang in an alley and wept afterward. Now, Jongho is well fed and well-hidden thanks to charms purchased from Hongbin last year. Now that he's no longer working on a deficit, Jongho is happy to take a few pulls of Yeosang's blood every few nights, or kill him once every couple of weeks. Yeosang suspects that Jongho enjoys killing him, simply because it means he gets to pin Yeosang down in the bed they still share, gets to put his nose to Yeosang's neck, to kiss the skin over the artery he prefers to bite. Sometimes, he is gone when Yeosang wakes, sheepishly coming back in a little later, and other times he is simply laying in the bed beside Yeosang, holding his hand.

It's not that Yeosang is actively encouraging Jongho, but the bite clearly means very much to him. It is a symbol of trust, a moment of mindblowing intimacy. Yeosang is sure that, if he could remain hard through the process, he probably would. But he can't, given that Jongho is sucking out all his blood. So the point is moot.

Right now, Jongho is out at one of many of the city's clubs. Yeosang doesn't care for all the noise, but Jongho finds the stimulation exciting, because it makes him feel more alive. Hongbin's charms—spelled chains and medallions that are somehow sunk into Jongho's skin, making them impossible to remove unless he wishes for it to happen—are truly a godsend. They let Jongho walk in the sun, appear more human, and enhance his senses (as though his own aren't enough—he'd been able hear Yeosang's heartbeat from half a mile away before and now that distance is nearly three miles.)

They aren't enough for him. No, Jongho is the type to enjoy the press of bodies, all the breathing, all the noise, all that _life_. For a time, anyway—until he becomes exhausted of it and comes home.

So Jongho goes out to dance knowing that he'll be safe on his own and Yeosang does as he pleases. What he usually pleases is taking slow walks to food stands and book stores. Stopping in to see Rosalia, chatting and ordering plates of fries to fill his seemingly bottomless stomach. Watching the kids at the skate park and wishing he still had his own collection of skateboards, long since gone. Sold, to be able to make room for... Well. Other things. Other people. Who weren't worth losing his skateboards for, as it turned out.

Yeosang know it's healthy that he and Jongho have lives outside one another. Given his own still lingering attachment to his mentor, Yeosang encourages Jongho's independence. There have even been times where Jongho stays with a new friend or a gang of misfits or just wanders to different parts of the city for a few days—he always comes home when he needs to feed. Jongho hasn't fed from anyone except Yeosang all year. Yeosang doesn't mind that. Jongho is still very afraid of killing someone and despite his greater control Yeosang will indulge him until he's comfortable, so he doesn't fear the temptation of killing anyone.

And Yeosang has become... A bit complacent. Unworried. He's died more frequently, maybe four times in the past year? All the results of a mugging or hit-and-run from behind. For that reason, Yeosang never expects an attack from the front. He always expects them to come from the back, always thinks that nothing and no one has the gall to attack from the front.

He is very, very wrong.

The knife is buried in Yeosang's body before he even has a chance to cry out, the hilt pressed to his shirt. He's being pulled in against another body, pulled into an alley, pushed against a wall. This all seems very distressingly familiar, Yeosang thinks.

“don't move,” comes his attacker's voice, unexpectedly high, soft and sweet and whispering. He's wearing a hooded sweatshirt and a facemask beneath his chin and stretching to his jaw. “won't kill. don't move. please don't.”

Yeosang barely _breathes _as the attacker, so much like Jongho, pulls his head to one side. He hears the mask being pulled down. His attacker licks for the artery. Breathes hotly against the skin and then... The bite, Yeosang can't... Feel the bite. At all. He can't even feel the sucking, the motion is that gentle.

It's almost like getting a very slow hickey, and Yeosang hasn't thought about anything like that in a decade. He's so used to Jongho. He's so used to Jongho's bites and he's—he's getting _hard, _panting, trying not to move, because even if a knife wound won't kill him they're still unpleasant until they heal, especially if an internal organ is damaged badly enough.

His attacker breathes into the back of his neck, nose in his hair. The wounds must be minuscule, there's no spill down his shirt—else the assailant is a very neat eater. Everything smells like the most delicate florals, soft and barely there, like a lingering shampoo smell but more... Real. A thigh is pressed between Yeosang's legs and he jerks but the knife moves with him, one hand shifts to hold his lower back. He is dragged up, his groin pressed to the man's side.

And—and Yeosang can't stop_, _he can't, he's just rocking his hips and panting and his fingers are grabbing at the back of the sweatshirt and—and Yeosang hasn't even so much as _masturbated _in nearly a decade and the vampire is thrumming, pulsing with magic and that scent, it's so intense—

The hand holding Yeosang's back jerks up to carefully cover his mouth. Yeosang lets out a distressed sound, hips rocking, lungs heaving, wetness in his briefs, hot and slick. He feels a lick across his neck. He shudders as the knife is pulled out of his side. His attacker sinks to his knees, the wound on Yeosang's belly is tenderly licked while his hips are pushed against the wall, though... He can't do anything about it, he's... He's too shaky, too exhausted, too...

“i'm sorry,” the man whispers, helping Yeosang down to the ground to sit on the tarmac. He's still panting, one hand covering Yeosang's mouth. The man moves that hand away, kisses Yeosang _deeply, _tongue and teeth and lip until Yeosang moans and the kiss softens to become sweet and tender. “i'm sorry. thank you.” Then, a lick to his lips and the man—his attacker, the vampire—is gone.

Yeosang is left there, panting, barely able to breathe, or think, or do anything. He feels that his phone is vibrating and struggles to get it out of his back pocket. It's so difficult.

“Jongho,” he breathes, head rolling like he's going to fall asleep.

“Yeosang!” Jongho sounds positively panicked. “Yeosang where _are _you?”

“Don't...” Yeosang's vision swims. Everything ripples, an echo of itself. “Don't know.”

“Can you turn on your location?” Jongho asks. “I can't hear your heart, I can't find you.”

“...maybe...”

Yeosang struggles to keep his eyes open, his vision clear enough to find the location widget and hit it. Barely manages to hit the, 'yes I'm fucking sure' pop-up before he collapses back into the wall.

When he wakes up again, he's laying in his bed with Jongho tucked up to his side, an arm braced protectively around him. His head is swimming, but he manages to push himself up with a groan, jostling Jongho enough to wake him up.

“Yeosang,” he says, frantic. “Yeosang, Jesus, are you okay?”

“What...” Yeosang shakes his head in an attempt to clear it. That just gives him a headache. “Excedrin,” he says, pushing against his eyes with one hand. Jongho is immediately gone and back again, two pills and a water bottle and an eyemask in hand. Yeosang takes the pills with the water, gags a little as he always does and lets Jongho put the mask onto his face. He lays back into his pillow and doesn't move until his brain is a little less swollen.

“What happened,” he asks. His memories of the night before are very surreal and dreamlike.

“I found you in an alley half-drained,” Jongho whispers, his head pressed to the left side of Yeosang's chest as it always is. “Jesus I thought you were dead, your heartbeat was so slow, so _faint. _What got you?”

“I can't...” A knife. A thigh, a bite like a kiss. The smell of flowers and an orgasm that made his heart stop._ i'm sorry. thank you._

“A vampire, it... He wasn't trying to kill me. Stopped, he wasn't trying to kill me.”

“I can see that,” Jongho says. “You don't have any wounds, just scars.”

Yeosang's scars fade easily with time, so most of Jongho's don't last very long. Yeosang wonders, if Jongho licked his bites like he were kissing them, they would heal like that. He has an odd and wondering curiosity that if Jongho bit him like that during his daily bite stints and took only a few mouthfuls, would Yeosang get hard?

“From the front, he... Stabbed me, I think just to... To scare me? It didn't... Didn't cause any damage, it closed right up, he knew what he was doing.”

“Apparently,” Jongho says, cupping Yeosang's cheek in one hand. His hand is big, and warm, and Yeosang is still so tired. He tips his head into Jongho's touch. He feels Jongho's thumb rub across the bottom of the eyemask. “You scared the shit out of me.”

“Not my fault,” Yeosang says, his lips on Jongho's palm, near his wrist.

“I can still smell him on you.”

“I—”

“I hate it,” Jongho hisses. “_I hate it._” Yeosang smiles. Jongho is such a kid sometimes, getting all moody and possessive. Yeosang reaches to tangle his hand into the back of Jongho's hair, smoothing it then messing it up. Maybe it's because he's so tired—maybe it's because his orgasm had reminded his body that it had been a literal decade and that's far too long for a twenty-year-old body. Regardless, he says it.

“So... Make me smell like you.”

Yeosang doesn't take the eye mask off. Doesn't try to stop Jongho from getting on top of him, doesn't try to tell Jongho 'no' with his eyes or his body, as he normally might, not that Jongho's ever done this before. He hasn't. But it doesn't feel strange or inappropriate. It doesn't feel like they're crossing a line, only moving into the next logical step in their relationship.

Yeosang lays in his bed and lets Jongho get between his legs, his bare legs. Jongho doesn't have clothes on, either. They'd been separated by the blankets before. Now there is nothing between them, and Yeosang can feel how hard Jongho is. He'd killed Yeosang only a couple of nights ago, so it's not exactly surprising that he has enough blood to maintain an erection. Yeosang is just... surprised at the force with which Jongho is pinning him to the bed, the way Jongho is moving their hips together. That the simple stimulation is enough to make Yeosang hard, too.

Yeosang moans when Jongho presses harder against him, causing his body to roll up a little.

“Wrap your legs around me, Yeosang?” Jongho says, sliding his hands down Yeosang's thighs and guiding him to do just that. Yeosang hasn't had actual sex since... Since before he died the first time. He hasn't even thought about it much, really. It's just never been a concern. Besides there was always the threat of a slow death succumbing to an STI. He could kill himself to get rid of it, but he'd rather not. Such a hassle.

Regardless of the distance in time, Yeosang remembers the motions. He wraps his legs around Jongho's waist and moves his angle, and isn't surprised when Jongho reaches to hold him from beneath, spread his cheeks and rest his length between them. He's just surprised by how... Wet it is. But the slow thrust feels... It feels good, and Yeosang reaches up above his head, holds on to the pillow as Jongho slowly ruts against him, just—just letting himself _feel _it, because it _does _feel good. Jongho's big, he thinks, or maybe he's just a bad judge after so long. The slick push and pull of Jongho's length against him is a tease that makes Yeosang shake.

He'd forgotten how much he likes this. Or maybe he'd forced himself to forget, because of all it had cost him in another life. It had cost him so much, it had cost him... Everything. Up to and including his life.

Jongho takes Yeosang's arms away from the pillow. “Hold on to me, Yeosang?” he whispers, and Yeosang does, letting Jongho lead him. It feels so good not to be the one in charge. Just for a little while, just... Just for a few minutes, it's so good to let go.

“Jongho,” Yeosang breathes out his name and should be ashamed of the moan but he just. Isn't. If anything he's glad for the way it makes Jongho thrust harder against him, the sound his groin hitting against Yeosang is so erotic. Yeosang can't see, he's at Jongho's mercy, and he trusts Jongho.

“Jongho, bite...” Yeosang licks his lips. “Bite me when—”

Jongho hisses, hips kicking like he can't help but thrust faster. Yeosang moans again, pushed into the bed as one of Jongho's hands wraps around Yeosang's length and strokes, wet and slick and twisting his wrist at the tip to pull just a little—just—

“Jongho—” Yeosang gasps out, eyes closing behind the mask as he orgasms for the second time that night, shivering violently. He feels Jongho bite into him, one hand holding the hair at the back of Yeosang's neck to drag him forward, the other still stroking him. His bite is unexpectedly tender, warm and lingering. Something... Hot and wet is dripping between Yeosang's cheeks but... But he's getting tired, and Jongho is licking slow at his neck, bringing his mouth to Yeosang's in a series of little presses and then... Then he kisses Yeosang. Really kisses him.

It's wet, and warm. Tasting like blood and Jongho's own special flavor, something sweet but sharp. Yeosang kisses him back, slides his hands up into Jongho's hair because it feels good, because he feels good and Jongho made him feel good and he wants to show his appreciation for that. It's sloppy, and messy—saliva and blood and Jongho's teeth in Yeosang's lip and Yeosang's tongue on Jongho's bottom fangs. Yeosang cuts his tongue on Jongho's teeth on purpose just to feel Jongho suck it, lick it closed—pleasuring Yeosang while feeding himself.

“You're so beautiful,” Jongho whispers, moving to lay beside him with his thigh across Yeosang's leg, not bothering to clean them up, not bothering to move. Just laying there with his head on Yeosang's chest like it usually is and Yeosang lets him. Takes comfort in their closeness and as always, lets his lips rest in Jongho's hair while Jongho's hand presses over his heart.

> _It is July 2nd, 2021._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang,_
> 
> _aged twenty years and eleven after._
> 
> _Attacked by a vampire for the second time. _
> 
> _I'm starting to wonder if this is my calling._


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> part two of our double update!

> _It is July 2nd, 2021._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang,_
> 
> _aged twenty years and eleven after._
> 
> _Jongho and I were intimate last night. _
> 
> _I'm not sure he really enjoyed it._

Yeosang is so beautiful, Jongho thinks. He's thought so since that day in August, when Yeosang saved his life. He's small-framed, with long legs. His hair is long and dark and while his smiles are small and few, they fill Jongho's chest with starlight every time he sees them.

Still.

Jongho isn't convinced that what they did—what _he _did, really—last night is a good thing. It... Jongho had just been so _worried. _So afraid when he found Yeosang collapsed in an alley, half-dead and smelling like sex and... And someone else.

It's not that Jongho is particularly sexual. He doesn't really get the urge to do that kind of thing anymore though he does still occasionally masturbate, usually after biting and killing Yeosang, but that's not the same as what he did last night. That's just a weird bodily function he has to take care of, that feels good but is not... Necessary? Not that it's not _pleasurable, _it's just... Mostly annoying. It's not like he can comfortably fall asleep next to Yeosang with a hard-on.

But he does know he's protective. He's afraid that what he'd done last night will change things between them. He wonders if he's just... Irrevocably damaged their relationship. He wonders if Yeosang really wanted to, considering he'd never taken the eyemask off. Maybe he had expected Jongho to do it?

Jongho isn't sure he wants to do it again, either. Had it really been just a possession thing? What if it was just him expressing his frustration at the attack sexually? Had he given Yeosang enough chances to say no? Would Yeosang have said no, even if he did?

Jongho knows he has very strong feelings for Yeosang, of course he does. Yeosang saved him, Yeosang takes care of him and keeps him safe. Jongho just isn't sure if those feelings are... Romantic. Does he love Yeosang like that? Jongho has messed around with people before, he's not a virgin. He's just confused. But he's not sure he can talk to Yeosang about it since... Well, it's _about _Yeosang. But maybe that's a good reason to talk to him about it? The best reason?

But this morning—afternoon? He just broods over it, thinks himself in circles as he neatens up the apartment—washes the dishes, washes Yeosang's clothes. They still smell like whoever had their teeth in him last night, barely-there florals and blood.

Maybe that's what he's angry about. It's not that Yeosang can't take care of himself, because he can. But he was... Taken advantage of, maybe? And Jongho hadn't been there to help him, hadn't been able to help at all. That makes him feel awful. Even though Yeosang hadn't been hurt and all the semen in his clothes belonged to him, smelled like him, he still feels awful.

And Yeosang had said he'd been stabbed? Jongho hadn't seen any wounds or scars like the bite on Yeosang's neck, pale and silvery. Maybe he'd just been keyed up and imagined it? Maybe—

“Jongho?” comes Yeosang's weak voice and Jongho is instantly in the bedroom, looking at him.

“What's wrong?”

Yeosang looks confused.

“How long was I asleep?”

“About ten hours.” It's nearly two in the afternoon now. Yeosang looks extremely disoriented, not like himself at all. Maybe a lingering after-effect of the bite? Jongho doesn't know anything about other vampires except what Hongbin's told him and he suspects that Hongbin tells him very little on purpose. He's like that. All... Obnoxiously coy and sly and always acting like he knows something Jongho doesn't, which he probably does but he doesn't need to rub it in.

“Yeosang?”

“Can. Can you make coffee, Jongho, I'm gonna take a shower.”

Jongho had wiped them both down last night, after Yeosang's heartbeat had gone steady with sleep. He hadn't wanted Yeosang to wake up sticky with sweat. Or anything else.

But Yeosang goes to take a shower, and Jongho makes coffee, which he still likes the smell of even though he can't drink it anymore.

There are a lot of things Jongho misses about being alive. Coffee, cheeseburgers, Oreos. Food in general. It's nice that he can go outside during the day though. At least he doesn't have to give up the sun. Hongbin's charms have worked miracles for him and he appreciates it so much. He'd been so afraid he would have to spend the rest of his life in the dark.

But mostly he just misses being normal. Having a pulse, a heartbeat. That's part of why he likes to sleep with Yeosang—his heartbeat is so good to hear. Sometimes Jongho pretends that it's _his _heartbeat, too.

Jongho stands at the coffee maker, watching it drip. He jumps when Yeosang touches his shoulder, just like he does every time someone touches him unexpectedly, just as he always has. Yeosang has never asked him about that, and Jongho is grateful. As much as he misses being normal, there are some parts of his normal life he wasn't sorry to leave behind.

Maybe someday he'll tell Yeosang about it. About living with his mom and his mom's husband. About _why _he'd been out in a club on a weeknight with a complete stranger, anyway. Why he hasn't been worried about contacting them. He thinks Yeosang probably already suspects, but he also respects Jongho's privacy.

“Oh, lemme get out of the way,” he says, ducking to one side. Yeosang gives him one of those fond little smiles Jongho loves so much. It makes Jongho feel all warm and fluttery and happy. This is the way he usually feels around Yeosang. Light, happy. Nothing like what happened last night. Maybe it had been a possession thing.

“You're not in my way, Jongho,” Yeosang says, even as he gives Jongho a light hipcheck. He's still smiling when he turns to the coffee maker. “How did you sleep?”

“Good,” Jongho says, though he can feel his own anxious energy making him jittery. “Really good.”

“I'm glad to hear that,” Yeosang says.

Jongho is nearly vibrating by the time Yeosang gets his coffee and sits down in his chair, curled up under a blanket in the afternoon sun coming in through the window. He's so beautiful. So painfully, exquisitely beautiful.

“I'm sorry,” Jongho just... Blurts out, because it was going to come out anyway, eventually. “I'm sorry. About last night, I—I shouldn't have done that.” Yeosang looks at him and Jongho feels so... Seen. Like Yeosang is x-raying his entire body right down to his soul. But his gaze isn't critical, or uncaring. He looks... Soft. A little worried, maybe.

“You didn't hurt me, Jongho.”

“It's not that, it's—” Jongho cuts himself off and swallows, even though he doesn't need to. Human habits are slow to die. “It's just. I didn't ask, and you didn't say you wanted to, and I'm not sure _I _even wanted to, and I don't know if it's because I was freaked out about you getting hurt or if I was just getting possessive or something stupid like that and I—”

“Jongho.” Yeosang's voice is a little amused. “Slow down. C'mon, sit down so we can talk.”

Jongho sits down. He's very stiff, and he tries to relax a little. This is Yeosang. It's just Yeosang. But it's also never... _Just _Yeosang.

“Firstly,” Yeosang says, taking a sip of coffee. “You didn't do anything to me that I didn't want you to do.” Jongho almost collapses in relief.

“Secondly,” Yeosang continues. “You don't need to justify it to me. Whether it was to help you confirm that I was well, or to help you confirm that I was here with you—these things don't matter to me. Like I said, you didn't hurt me.”

“But I—”

“And lastly,” Yeosang cuts him off with his gentle, gentle voice. “I'm not angry with you. Not even a little, so you don't have to worry about that.”

Jongho wants to cry and forces himself not to. He doesn't want to lose any blood right now. Instead he sniffs and nods, taking deep, slow breaths to calm himself, even though he doesn't need to breathe. He still likes the motion of it. Again, human habits and all.

“Now,” Yeosang says. “You said you're not sure you wanted to?”

“Yeah,” Jongho says, feeling very young and foolish under Yeosang's eyes. “Yeah it. I. I mean I don't... It's not that it was bad, it's just not... Something I want to do again, I don't think. Like... Not soon?”

“That's fine,” Yeosang says. “It's okay to not want to touch anyone sexually. You're not required to do that. Not me, not anyone.”

Jongho nods, swallowing around the stone in his throat. “I'm still sorry. I didn't even ask if it was okay.”

“I promise, Jongho, I would have told you to stop if you were hurting me, or I didn't want to,” Yeosang assures him. “Now. Moving away from all of that, how are you feeling about us having sex? Is that something you feel _bad _about, or something you just feel neutral about.”

“It... It's not like when I... Y'know, after the bite, sometimes. That's kind of stupid, it's just something that happens.” Jongho blushes furiously and licks his lips. How _does _he feel about this whole thing? Under all of his guilt and confusion, he thinks he's... “I think I'm just happy that I could make you feel good,” he says. “I mean, you got attacked. I wanted you to feel... Good. Safe? Protected, maybe.” Yeosang gives him another one of those little starlight smiles. Jongho's chest warms.

“I felt all of those things,” Yeosang assures him. “Thank you, for making me feel them. I appreciate that, Jongho. But please don't ever feel pressured to do it again unless you want to.”

That's a little confusing. What if he never wants to? What if he never wants to do it again? He voices these concerns and Yeosang just shrugs.

“If I feel it necessary, I can have sex at my leisure with any partner I choose. You're not obligated, Jongho. Please don't feel that way.” Yeosang reaches across the short distance between them and touches Jongho's cheek, cups his jaw. Jongho leans into it, like he always does.

“Above all else, you are my charge, and my friend,” Yeosang says. “And I don't want you to do anything you don't want to. All right? You don't need to force yourself to do anything, and you don't need to expect it of yourself. You shouldn't. Can you do that for me?”

Jongho nods, feeling a few tears squeeze out. He hears Yeosang chuckle.

“Though, if you thought you were being subtle about masturbating after you kill me—”

“Yeosang!!” Jongho gasps, trying not to feel scandalized and embarrassed even though he'd all but admitted it not more than three minutes ago. It's another thing entirely to actually _talk _about it and besides, it's _embarrassing. _He's not even sure why he getsan erection after killing Yeosang it just! Happens sometimes!

But Yeosang's chuckle turns into a laugh. He laughs so rarely. It makes him even more beautiful as he sits there, glowing in the afternoon sun, his skin golden and his dark hair damp. He's one of the most beautiful things, most beautiful people, Jongho has ever seen.

“You're so beautiful Yeosang,” Jongho says, out loud and meant to be heard for the first time since they've met. Yeosang smiles at him. “I mean it. You're so beautiful, and... And I love you. Even if it's maybe not, I don't know, the romantic or sexual way, I'm not really... Sure about all of that but I do love you.”

“I know,” Yeosang says, tucking himself into his chair. “I love you too, Jongho. I'm glad you found me.”

“Even if I literally killed you?” Jongho asks, laughing a little.

“You 'literally kill me' every two weeks or so,” Yeosang replies. “So yes.”

And Jongho laughs, feeling lighter, more relaxed, happier than he has in a long time he thinks, though he's not sure why. He feels like something heavy has just been removed from his chest—a weight he hadn't even known was there getting lifted away.

Its removal leaves more room for stars.

> _It is July 2_ _nd_ _, 2021._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang,_
> 
> _aged twenty years and eleven after._
> 
> _Jongho and I spoke of last night. _
> 
> _His honesty is awe-inspiring, and I love him very, very much._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i like jongho a lot. he's a soft confused boy and i love him.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> some descriptions of violence in this one? some very vaguely sexual content. lime, if you will. nothing too much, i don't think.   
enjoy!

> _It is October 13th, 2021._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang,_
> 
> _aged twenty years and eleven after._
> 
> _Hongbin has told me much of vampires. _
> 
> _The more I learn, the more I grow protective._

It's been three months since the incident with the other vampire. Yeosang hasn't encountered him since, and neither has Jongho. In a way, that's a good thing, but in others...

Yeosang thinks that the other vampire glamoured him. After speaking to Hongbin about it, and demanding more information, Yeosang has learned about all kinds of vampires and vampiric abilities. One of which is called “glamour.” It's a tactic vampires use to subdue their victims with as little violence as possible, or to make themselves more difficult to detect among the living. Yeosang is fairly sure that he was glamoured. Especially with the way he'd told Jongho he'd been stabbed, though there had been no stab wounds or scars, and the light floral smell had been out of the ordinary, to say the least.

Hongbin told him not to fuss too much about the incident. It was a very common practice and vampires killed less people that way. Subdue, take what they need, leave their prey confused but alive.

_i'm sorry. thank you._

It's the sincerity in that 'thank you' that Yeosang can't let go of. He just can't get over it. It felt wrong at the time, the apology, but the more he thinks about it the more puzzled he becomes. Even Jongho has noticed that he's been distracted, and teases him for it regularly.

“Where are you going?” he asks, as Yeosang pulls on a light jacket. It's October now, but the city isn't too cold just yet.

“Out,” Yeosang smiles, and Jongho squints at him, but nods. “I'll have my phone.”

“Just. Use it.” Jongho mutters, even as he gives Yeosang a kiss on the cheek, as he always does when they part.

It feels good, that he and Jongho have found a rhythm. Jongho hasn't initiated anything sexual, and Yeosang has not asked him to. But the closeness is nice. Little goodbye kisses, long hugs. Yeosang likes giving the contact to Jongho who, since Yeosang met him, has always shied away from that kind of thing. He hadn't seemed to enjoy any physical contact at all outside of the bite, and perhaps holding hands; but Yeosang has suspicions. He won't ask Jongho to confirm them, but he's happy they're touching one another more now either way.

Yeosang gives Jongho another smile on his way out, leaving the apartment for the slight chill of mid October. He walks around familiar places, and into not so familiar places, always searching for a scent or a line of thrumming magic. He's not sure why he's searching, really. Or what he hopes to find.

_Maybe this is my mission, _he'd written all those months ago. Saving vampires, keeping them out of trouble, safe from harm. Especially lone vampires who, according to what Hongbin has told him, generally don't last very long.

_They're just really vulnerable, _Hongbin had said, chin in his hand. _They don't have a nest or a companion to stay with them, they don't have anyone to teach them. Most of the time they're pretty new, fledgelings, and also physically young like Jongho, since younger people are easier to turn. Most of them don't make it through the gamut of Hunters that are always out these days. Fucking bastards, killing anyone they don't think is human enough. Vampires, witches, anything. _He'd spat on the ground, given Yeosang a few illustrations to show what symbols Hunters wore, and how they wore them. _Don't give them any respect if you meet them, Yeosang. They're just murderers. _His voice had been cold and brittle and hateful.

Yeosang is thinking about that, about Hongbin's private and fathomless anger, when he feels a little pull of magic. He closes his eyes to discern its source direction. A deep breath, and he follows it. It's wavering and high, sweet like a violin note. It's almost enjoyable to listen to, a fairly soft sound, but then it starts to pulse and shiver, harder, louder as the source of it grows more frantic and afraid. Like a heart pulsing faster faster faster in panic. Yeosang's walk turns into a run, and he runs until he hears shouting. Things being knocked over, snarled threats, cries of pain.

Yeosang comes across the scene with a gasp—running down an alley that intersects with another, he watches two men in dark leathers chase a smaller man, who slams into the back corner of the brick alley with a wet cry, visibly bleeding despite the dark. Yeosang can't feel what kind of magic the man is giving off yet—it feels like Jongho but... less aggressive. Regardless, the source of it—that smaller man—likely doesn't deserve whatever these men are trying to do to him. He doesn't _feel _dangerous.

“Stop!” Yeosang shouts. He doesn't hesitate to throw himself from the opening through which he'd seen the small man running. He lunges forward and to the left—catching a knife to the arm as he blocks the aim of the assailant that had been about to kill the vampire—yes, he is a vampire, Yeosang can feel it now—on the ground in front of him. The assailants are Hunters, by their clothes and the sigils around his necks, hanging like several lengths of dog chain ending in medallions on their chests. Yeosang hauls in a breath of pain, but it's just a stab wound, it won't last long. It definitely won't kill him.

“Stop, what are you _doing?_” he snarls, now that his body is between the Hunter—one of the two—and the cowering vampire they've trapped in this dark place. He pulls the vampire against his chest, hauling him up. He smells like soft florals and blood. He sounds like he's choking.

“What the fuck are _you_ doing, you—”

“This boy is my charge!” Yeosang snaps, without thinking—but the vampire's shaking hands fist in the front of Yeosang's jacket. He's whimpering, the gasps wet and ghastly. Yeosang can hear him, and there's a distinct smell of burnt skin, hot wetness spilling down his front. They've used some kind of silver against him, or a blessed weapon. One small man against two big ones. One small, quivering boy against two hulking Hunters. Vampire or not, the odds are unfair, especially when the vampire _feels _weak, so the scales weren't even to begin with.

_They're just murderers._

_i'm sorry. thank you._

“What,” sneers one Hunter, looming closer. “You think that excuses him from being a goddamned bloodsucker? You think that fucking _means _anything?” Yeosang narrows his eyes toward the brick wall.

“One more step,” he says, his voice low, and hard. “And I will make you rue the day you were born.” The knife wound in his arm is already healed.

“I ain't scared a'you you fucking—” One Hunter jumps forward. Yeosang turns around and the knife drives straight into the space between his heart and his collarbone. It's not fatal. It won't kill him. Yeosang knows it will heal very quickly, given that it's a smooth blade, and he stares at the man in front of him. Widens his eyes and bares his teeth. Pushes himself forward the last two inches of the blade. It hurts, but it will heal. Yeosang will always heal.

_Maybe this is my mission. _

Yeosang stares right into the Hunter's face. He's not afraid of him. Yeosang isn't afraid of _anything, _in this moment. Not these Hunters, not a death. Nothing. This savagery is not acceptable. Yeosang will not stand for this violence enacted against a creature who clearly can't defend themselves and worse, likely hasn't done anything to deserve being hunted at all. Yeosang stares into the eyes of that Hunter and watches the fear and panic roll over the man's face. Feels him jerk the knife out and the wound is pulsing blood, already closing, it's already mended. Smooth blade, nothing vital hit. Easy healing. He gets worse from Jongho's bites when he's feeling overenthusiastic. Yeosang leans forward, and the Hunter staggers back.

“If I find you're attempting to put hands on _any _of my charges again,” he hisses, knowing he looks terrifying, knowing his eyes are dark and his face is likely twisted into something horrifying, as Gunwoo's always had been when he was in the middle of a fit. Yeosang tries to draw on that mania now, as much as he can. “I will have your heads and your balls on _plates._ Get out of here.”

They back away—to run, to stare? But Yeosang doesn't care about them. He doesn't care if they listen. He's too busy turning, focusing on the vampire in his arms, now heaving up blood—but not from his mouth. From the brutal, ragged slice they've made across his neck. He's choking and gagging with one hand trying to hold the wound closed. Fucking savages. They'd planned to make the vampire _suffer _before they killed him_. _

“Come,” Yeosang says, crowding the vampire to the wall. “Come, you can drink. You won't kill me, you need to feed.” The vampire whimpers, shaking his head, and Yeosang reaches to hold that pale, cool face in his hands. “I promise that there is no way you can kill me,” he says, and reaches beneath the hood to push back oily, tangled hair before pressing his other hand against the cut in the vampire's throat, helping to hold the cut skin together. “Feed. Please.”

The vampire leans forward. Grabs at Yeosang's jacket a little harder, a little more desperately. There is the scent of flowers. A gentle bite. Yeosang is slowly lowered to the ground as he loses blood but he can hear the breathing become normal. So this vampire is young enough that he still breathes? Perhaps he's Jongho's age? Maybe even younger. Or perhaps, like Jongho, he simply likes the motion of breathing. All that matters is that he gets fed. That he doesn't bleed out all over the pavement.

He does _kill _Yeosang. Like Jongho, when Yeosang comes back, the vampire is crying. Only he's holding Yeosang's body, cradling him to his chest, rocking back and forth and humming out sounds rather than actual words. His grip is tender, fingers shaking but holding on regardless.

“Hush,” Yeosang breathes, a little disoriented as he always is after coming back. “Hush, it's all right. Come on, get us up. I'll bring you home.”

“...home?” the vampire asks, clearly confused but willing to grab on to any rope thrown to him and Yeosang, unable to do anything but smile fondly, nods.

“Yeah. Home.”

_Maybe this is my mission. _

Yeosang gets steady on his feet and offers his hand. It's startling, how much the boy is like Jongho, when Yeosang first found him. He's obviously frightened and worried, even though Yeosang can't get a good look at his face with his hood and his hair and his mask—wrapped around his jaw and over his mouth—back in place and in the way. He's bare-footed and covered in blood but that doesn't matter. What matters is that he's safe, that the Hunters are gone.

With his free hand, Yeosang wiggles his phone out of his back pocket. Dials Jongho.

“Yeosang?”

“Are you at the apartment?”

“Yeah, why?”

“I'm bringing another home.”

“Another?”

“Another vampire.”

Jongho sucks in a rush of air and Yeosang waits for the objection, but it never comes.

“Okay,” Jongho says. “Should I run a bath?”

“Yes, if you could,” Yeosang says, smiling to himself. “We'll be there soon. Thank you, Jongho.”

“No problem,” Jongho says. “Get here safe.”

“We will.”

Yeosang hangs up, and keeps his grip on the vampire's hand gentle, only tightening it when the vampire clings his fingers. He crowds against Yeosang just as Jongho did, looking for safety against his body, and Yeosang keeps the vampire's pace, instead of his own. It takes a little longer to get home, but he gets them there. He leads the vampire upstairs to where Jongho is waiting, twisting his fingers together.

“Are you okay?” is the first thing he asks, followed quickly by, “Are they okay?”

“Yes, I think so,” Yeosang says, having to gently tug the vampire—who had been standing in the doorway, frozen the instant Jongho came into view—inside. “Come on, lets get you washed up.” The vampire keeps his head down and Jongho purses his lips.

“I'll get him some clothes?”

“Please. Thank you.”

Jongho shakes his head. “Don't thank me for being decent, Yeosang.” He does press a little kiss to Yeosang's cheek, though. “I'm glad you're home.” He gives the newcomer, who is now practically attached to Yeosang's back with his hands white-knuckled in the sides of Yeosang's jacket, a rueful little smile.

“I'm glad he's here, too.”

Yeosang had expected that Jongho might be jealous? Angry, even. His calm and compassion are appreciated, and Yeosang returns the little kiss.

“We'll be out soon.”

Yeosang walks the vampire through the master bedroom and into the master bath. Lets him cling until the door is closed, and then gently moves away. The vampire whimpers, and Yeosang hushes him softly. He doesn't want to hurt him or frighten him by walking away.

“Lets get you out of these clothes and into the bath, all right?”

It takes a long moment, but the vampire nods, and lets Yeosang push his hood back, pull his mask off. He's beautiful. A beautiful young man, with an angular nose and a full mouth and a sharp jaw. He has a shock of trauma-white hair near the front of his head, and while he's a bit gaunt, Yeosang is willing to bet that with proper feeding and care he'll fill out just as Jongho had.

“There you are,” Yeosang says, pushing the boys hair back, heart hurting when he flinches just like Jongho used to. Perhaps even more than Jongho, since he ducks his head and grits his teeth.

“You're all right,” Yeosang reassures, continuing his gentle touches through the dark hair, over the tense neck and shoulders. “It's all right, you're safe here. Do you want me to leave you alone to get washed up?”

He's not surprised when the boy shakes his head violently, shoving his head into Yeosang's shoulder and grabbing onto his jacket. Maybe this boy knew his maker, Yeosang thinks. Maybe his maker abandoned him, instead of just leaving him after the change. Maybe his maker is dead, and he's been taking care of himself without any real support system. There aren't any in place, Hongbin has explained. Vampires aren't particularly... Welcome in most magical circles, as it were, and they often live in isolation or small groups. Rarely, a large coven will take up residency in a city, but those tend to be more like dictatorships, and many individuals choose to stay alone. But there's nowhere for them to go, since there's no real sense of community. Nowhere for them to be truly safe since they're watching out for themselves.

“Okay,” Yeosang says. “Okay, lets get you undressed and cleaned up. I'm Yeosang,” he continues. “What's your name?”

It isn't until after Yeosang has helped the boy's shaking hands unzip his hoodie, and helped him to step out of his ill-fitted pants, that he hears an answer.

“...san?” he says, nearly a whisper. His vocal cords might still be healing. Or perhaps he just always speaks this way.

“Okay, San,” Yeosang says, smiling up at him. “I'm glad you're here.”

“charge?” he asks, looking down at Yeosang in such confusion that Yeosang's heart bleeds.

“Yes,” he replies, guiding San to the bathtub. The water is still warm. Jongho has added some salts to make the water smoother, and it smells very lightly of hyacinth, a sleep aid. Yeosang will have to thank him later. “You're my charge.”

“means...?”

“It means I'm going to take care of you from now on.” Yeosang says, holding San's hands as San lowers himself, very slowly, into the water. His skin is dirty, dusty like his hoodie had been. Yeosang lets go of one of San's hands to bring a loofah and a bar of soap a little closer to them. After getting a lather, Yeosang starts to wash San's shoulder as tenderly as he can, since San seems quick to spook and Yeosang doesn't want to scare him.

Luckily, after a few minutes San carefully takes the loofa and starts to wash himself. He's delicate and meticulous and when he's done, he looks at the bottles of shampoo and conditioner and, like a kid, holds his breath with his cheeks puffed out and pinches his nose before he lowers his head to get his hair wet. Then he washes his hair, raking his nails over his hair until Yeosang reaches out to ease his fingers.

“Like this, San,” he says, smoothing his fingertips over his scalp instead. “Don't scratch. You don't need to scratch.”

“hungry,” San says, looking at Yeosang with bubbles in his hair.

“When you're done getting cleaned up, you can feed.” Yeosang promises. San nods, lets Yeosang rinse his hair. Conditions it, does the same. Yeosang gets him up and turns on the shower while the tub drains, getting all the residue off San's skin. He's not as pale as he'd seemed—his mellow tan makes him almost gold in the bathroom lighting.

Yeosang wraps him in a towel and guides him to the master bedroom, where there is a little stack of clothes at the end of the bed along with a note from Jongho, saying that he'll be out for a few hours so the 'new kid' can get comfortable. Yeosang's heart hums at his thoughtfulness.

But Yeosang doesn't get San into the clothes. He barely manages to get him to the bed before San is pulling him closer and toppling them both over into the mattress, making sure Yeosang is on top of him. Yeosang tries to stop from falling, but San's long towel trips him. He lands between San's open legs and makes a sound of surprise. That flower smell again, San's arms around his shoulders. San pressing his bare groin up against Yeosang, gasping, licking at Yeosang's neck.

Yeosang wants to say something about how San doesn't need to do this—that Yeosang will let him feed regardless—but he... Can't find the mind to do it. Glamour, he remembers from a great distance. The floral smell is part of the glamour. He wants to push himself up and away, to tell San that it's unnecessary, but then San's gentle bite, his tender little sucking motions, the insistent rolling of his hips. Yeosang isn't sure he's hard, isn't sure how much blood his body has, but San doesn't seem to care about that. He just pushes up against Yeosang, mewling softly against his throat, into his bite. Yeosang is already lightheaded, since most of his blood is insistently rushing down to his cock, instead of up to his brain.

“San,” Yeosang manages, groin aching, cock throbbing. Damn, _damn. _How can he be so weak to such a simple sexual touch? He feels like a _teenager. _But that doesn't stop him from pressing down into San, no matter how unconsciously he does it. Doesn't stop him from groaning at the stimulation, orgasming into his jeans and shaking all over. “San.”

But San keeps sucking, licking, kissing. He keeps sucking and holds Yeosang to him and Yeosang dies like that, on top of San, cock still twitching.

When he wakes up, San is laying beside him, the two of them nude and tucked under the blankets in the center of the bed. San's hair is still damp, and Yeosang grumbles, putting a hand over his eyes.

They'll have to talk about that. About San pouncing on him to bite, and about the sexual contact during said bite. But... Not right now. Not right now, Yeosang is too tired, so he just lays in the bed with San's head on the right side of his chest, body tucked in close. He feels it when Jongho comes in, hums a greeting and takes up his position at Yeosang's left, ear over his heart. Yeosang is so comfortable. So warm, and so tired.

So foolishly, delightedly happy because he's... He's doing something right. He's doing _something _right.

> _It is October 14th, 2021._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang,_
> 
> _aged twenty years and eleven after._
> 
> _I now have two vampires under my care. _
> 
> _Maybe this really is my calling._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> how do we like our san-ie~


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a brief interlude with our jongho-yah~  
whipped up earlier today since people seemed curious :3

Sometimes, Jongho supposes that he should be... Mm. More possessive than he's being with Yeosang, regarding San. But San... Jongho feels a little pull towards him, feels this strange little warmth gather up in his belly when he looks at him, so he can't bring himself to be mad. Besides, San is so... Pathetic. Not in a bad way! In a sympathetic way. A compassionate way. San doesn't like to leave the apartment, and after Yeosang had obtained Hongbin's charms for him, Jongho often finds him out on the balcony, sitting in the sun and staring out over the city and sky. Sometimes he hums. Jongho thinks he'd have a beautiful singing voice, if he could sing.

That's the other thing. San has visible trouble communicating. It's like he knows the words but they won't come out, and he struggles to express what's happening in his brain at all. Like he's trapped in a labyrinth and can't find his way out.

Worst of all, sometimes—after he's drained Yeosang out to soft death—San will go to the second bathroom, turn on the shower, and throw up. Not a _lot, _not everything he took, but enough to make him cry, to make him use the shower instead of the toilet. It's like he's been trying to keep the blood down and it won't stay settled.

Jongho knows that San had been... Physically intimate with Yeosang the first time he'd bitten him at home. He'd been able to smell it, despite how San had cleaned Yeosang up afterward, tucked him into bed. He hadn't thrown up then, or at least there'd been no sign of it. And he hasn't, the few times Yeosang has let him—let him do that when Jongho isn't home. Jongho will come back at the tail end of it after hearing Yeosang's heart stop, and he'll catch San licking semen off Yeosang's belly, like dessert at the end of a meal. None of them have said anything about it.

Jongho's not sure they should? He doesn't want to embarrass San, or make him feel... Bad, about doing it. Maybe he likes it, maybe he can digest it, and it really is like dessert.

But Jongho has _also _caught San trying to run away. Literally, has grabbed him around the waist and pulled him back up the stairs, back into the apartment. It's not that he thinks San is running out into danger, it's just that San needs to be _here, _with him and Yeosang. He fits here. And he tells San that, in soft whispers as San cries and whines and twists in his arms. He gives San blood bags to refill his belly when he's cried so much he's losing blood, regardless of how San spits up half of it like a kid with babyfood they don't like, seemingly unable to stop himself, wincing and shaking his head. That just makes him cry more, which makes Jongho's heart _hurt _more.

“I'm sorry,” Jongho says, rocking San back and forth as San clings to him, desperately, like a lost child. “I'm sorry, San, but it's okay. It's okay, it's going to be okay.

Jongho really believes that's true. That San will heal, that San will re-learn how to speak, that San will feel as welcome in their home as Jongho and Yeosang want him to. That this strange problem he's having will pass, or at least they'll learn how to help him on a more conscious and physical level.

Tonight, San has chosen not to feed, visibly frustrated and upset. His shoulders are tight, his head is down, his mouth is a flat line instead of his usual sweet smile. Jongho follows him to one of the other bedrooms after promising Yeosang that it's okay, he'll help San for right now.

San is right where Jongho expected to find him: curled up nude on the bed and crying into a pillow, the sounds of his weeping muffled by both the material and his own throat.

“San,” Jongho says, and San shakes his head, buries himself further in the pillow. “San, please?”

San looks up at him and Jongho feels a well of such ache well up in his belly. Such pity, such _warmth. _

“You need to eat,” Jongho says, moving to sit on the bed, reaching out to move his fingers through San's dark hair, as Yeosang sometimes does. San shakes his head, wiping at his eyes.

“don't.”

“You do. You haven't eaten in days.” Jongho insists, as gently as he can. “Do you want to feed from me? Will that be easier?” Jongho killed Yeosang just the night before—is still full, blushed with something pretending to be mortality. San shrugs at him, sniffling, wiping at his eyes.

“Come on, lets try it. Maybe it'll help. You're too skinny, San, it's not healthy.”

_Healthy. _Like San is still a human and he isn't getting the proper nutrition from his meals or something. Someday Jongho will get out of the habit of thinking like a human, but he has a feeling it's going to take a while. That's all right. He has time.

So Jongho gets up onto the bed—he's already in a muscle tank-top—and lets San cautiously knock him to his back. He lets San straddle him, look down at him, teary and upset. He lets San push his sweats down and his tank up, so he can settle them bare groin-to-groin. Jongho lets San bend down to rub them together, listened to his breathing, feeling San's hands touching Jongho with great caution, the same way he does with Yeosang. Jongho isn't... It's not that he isn't getting hard, because he is_, _it's just more about the fact that this is something San needs and Jongho can give it to him, than it is about Jongho's own pleasure in any way. It definitely feels good, but Jongho doesn't necessarily feel like he needs to be an active participant aside from how he's smoothing his fingers up and down San's sides and back like he's comforting him.

San doesn't have enough blood in him to maintain an erection, but he pants and makes soft sounds anyway, shivering as he rocks against Jongho. Jongho just keeps up his touches, the drag of his fingernails and his tugs on San's hair, until San is shaking.

“cum,” San pleads, face buried in Jongho's stretched neck, tongue on his throat, ready to bite. “cum, please?”

Jongho focuses on that request. On the sounds San is making, how San's belly and groin feel good against him, warm and giving. He focuses on the way San's soft cock is rubbing perfectly against his tip, the way Jongho touches himself when he masturbates, and then Jongho is coming with a little gasp, and San bites him.

San's teeth are so sharp that Jongho barely feels them. He can feel the glamour, though. Can feel the way it wraps around him and San like a shroud, smelling so sweet and soft. Glamours don't effect other vampires, but it's interesting to feel. Just as it's interesting to feel San sucking, to feel San rocking, his back arching up and his hands fisting in the sheets instead of Jongho's hair.

San moans into the bite, tender and low.

“hold,” he whispers. “hold, hold me.”

Jongho does. He wraps his arms around San and holds him in place until San licks at his throat and then eases down his body to lick at the skin of his firm belly, cleaning away the... Well. Whatever it is. Jongho can't really see it as semen, since it's clear, but that's how it functions? It comes out of his dick during orgasm, does that automatically make it semen? Doesn't matter. The important thing is that San seems to be sated, half-full at least, and while Jongho is tired, he has no problem getting up—getting San up, too—and carrying him back to Yeosang's room. Yeosang is already asleep, and Jongho tucks San in against Yeosang's right side, shakes his head when San leans up for a kiss.

“I don't like kissing,” he says, smiling apologetically as San looks disappointed and more than a little hurt. Jongho tucks San's hair back. “It's not you. I just don't like kissing on the lips, San. Can you kiss my cheek, instead?”

San nods, and does just that. Puts a warm, sweet kiss on Jongho's cheek and smiles at him when he settles against Yeosang's left. They both reach across his torso to hold one another's hands. It makes Jongho feel good, that he's helped San feel good. Helped him be able to eat. Maybe something changes chemically that makes blood more palatable to San. Maybe he's used to taking blood that way. He isn't really able to talk about his past, can't seem to remember it even if he _could _talk properly, so Jongho might never get an answer.

That's okay. That's okay, because San's hand is real and solid in his own, and San is smiling sleepily, and closing his eyes. San is meant to be here. Jongho wants him here. That's all there is to it.

It's that simple.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> real update in the next couple of days ♡♡+.ﾟ(￫ε￩*)ﾟ+.ﾟ   
thanks for your patience, guys!


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a proper update! no real warnings for this chapter. 
> 
> enjoy!

> _It is October 15th, 2021._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, aged twenty years and eleven after._
> 
> _My new charge is named San._

San can't remember the bite.

He can't remember the bite or where he got it or when he got it or how old he is or what year it is or anything except his name and he's not even sure it's his name, it's just the word people call him. Called him. Call him.

Yeosang calls him 'San' and Jongho calls him 'San.' That's what he told them to call him and so that must be his name.

But he can't remember the bite. When Yeosang asks him he shakes his head, feeling ashamed that he can't remember, ashamed and frightened and pathetic. He's embarrassed that he can't remember what year it is, or when his birthday is, or anything except survival tools: how to get food, shelter. How to be safe, how to keep hidden. He hates that he can't speak like he can think. He thinks fast, so fast and so much, it's all scattered and disconnected and tripping over itself, but his words are soft and slow and confused.

But he tries. He tries, and Yeosang listens.

He tries to explain that it's the only way he knows to give the bite—to give it while at the same time giving sexual pleasure. He tries to articulate that it makes the blood sweeter, which makes it more palatable, because he hates the taste and the texture and the smell but the words just won't come out.

He attempts to remember what happened, why he's alone, why he does what he does but he can't. He cries in frustration, in humiliation, in desperate sadness because even though Yeosang and Jongho are trying so hard to help him he's useless, he's useless. And that just makes him cry more, makes him feel _even more _pathetic. He tries to run away once but Jongho stops him, grabs him around the waist and drags him back in a way that makes him scream, though his scream is nothing more than a low and breathless cry, almost sobbing. Jongho doesn't let go. Jongho's stronger than he is. Jongho is well-fed and muscular, even though Jongho's shorter. He should be able to get away easily but instead he just collapses into miserable tears and Jongho rocks him back and forth and back while he clings, frightened of himself and everything else.

Yeosang comes back from the store to find Jongho and him like that, crumpled on the floor in the kitchen. Jongho has been feeding him Yeosang's blood from the bags they keep in the fridge to replenish him, because he's loosing blood by crying so much. His clothes look like a murder scene. How does he even know what a murder scene looks like? Has he caused one before? He doesn't know, he doesn't _know._

He does know that he doesn't deserve their kindness. He doesn't deserve Yeosang's gentle hands on his face and pushing back his hair, he doesn't deserve Yeosang's heartbeat under his ear or Jongho's hand holding his. He doesn't deserve anything.

He especially doesn't deserve how much Yeosang and Jongho take care of him for months. He doesn't deserve the purchased charms under his skin, or the clothes, the new shoes and jacket and pants. He isn't worth any of the care they give him for three months, or Yeosang saying that he's going to take him somewhere to see if someone else can help him. He doesn't deserve the way Jongho stays close to him as Yeosang brings him to a magic shop full of artifacts and trinkets and truly magical things to a man named Hongbin, who takes one look at him and smiles so tenderly it makes him want to collapse.

He does collapse. Jongho catches him.

Hongbin brings him to a room by himself. He cries when Yeosang has to stay outside. He doesn't want to be alone. He doesn't deserve Yeosang and Jongho but he wants them and he's scared. He's so scared as Hongbin touches him despite how he tries to jerk away. He tugs and pulls and finally whimpers, giving up. Hongbin doesn't let go of him. Hongbin is speaking a language he doesn't know. Hongbin is murmuring something, burning something and it scares him, it's scaring him, he's so afraid and his head feels like it's being torn apart, his throat is being ripped out, he cries out but it's not loud, he can't be loud, his voice is never loud—

And then it is.

Then his scream is actually a scream, and Hongbin is still holding onto him, but he's shushing him, soothing him, pressing his head to Hongbin's chest so he can hear Hongbin's heartbeat. It calms him, the slow, easy thumping. Hongbin is calm. Hongbin doesn't mind that he is crying, sobbing, and for the first time in what feels like an eternity San can hear his own voice above a whimper, above a whisper, above a breath.

San can speak. San can _remember. _

And he gasps in Hongbin's arms, grabbing at him, even though he doesn't need to breathe. Hasn't needed to breathe in a very long time.

“Yeosang,” Hongbin calls, reaching up to wipe away San's tears with a knowing smile on his face. “Yeosang, you're good, c'min.”

Yeosang, as though he'd been standing outside the door and holding onto the knob, comes into the room. His eyes are wide and frightened and San crumples at the sight of him as though he's seeing him for the first time all over again—so kind, so kind and generous and lovely. San reaches for him and for the first time says his name at full volume.

“Yeosang!” He's nearly shouting, though no one seems to mind. Yeosang laughs, maybe he's crying, but he pulls San up to his feet and hugs him fiercely. San is grinning so wide his cheeks hurt, has one arm across Yeosang's shoulders and the other reaches out to grab Jongho's lapel to fist it, wanting to hug him too, because he's been so good to San. Even though he didn't have to be, even though San has probably been really horrible and annoying and miserable to be around—

“Jongho,” San says, crying, smiling, unable to stop. “Yeosang, Yeosang, Jongho—”

San doesn't have a heartbeat anymore but if he did it would be thundering in his chest the way Yeosang's is, pulsing with joy and affection and care.

Hongbin just watches them, smiling a little, and San, when he can pull himself away from Yeosang and Jongho, hugs him too. Because he'd been the one to break... Whatever's been holding San down. Trapping him inside himself. And San is grateful, so grateful.

“You better stop crying,” Hongbin says. “Else you're gonna need to eat.”

“Teach me how,” San says, looking at Jongho. “Teach me how you do it. I don't want blood bags, they're gross, even if they're Yeosang's blood so you have to teach me how to do it right, so I don't have to—have to, you know—”

Jongho stares at him, then laughs. “When we go home,” he promises, reaching out to hold San's hand like he has every day for the last three months, even when he lets San do... _Those things _to him in desperation and hunger and aching sadness. “I promise I'll show you when we get home.”

He does.

They walk back home and San talks the whole way, exclaiming about the buildings and the people and the trees and the cars. Now that he can talk he never wants to _stop _talking. It makes Yeosang laugh and that's a wonderful, wonderful sound.

“Who knew you'd be such a chatterbox,” Yeosang says, as they step into the apartment San has begun to think of as home. “It's good to hear your voice though, San.”

“It's good to talk!” San says, grinning, and Yeosang reaches out to cup the side of his face. San tips his head into it, squishing his own cheek and smiling as bright as he can, feeling like he might burst.

“Come on,” Jongho says, pulling both of them toward the master bedroom. “Let me teach you how so we can see if it helps.”

So they are walking into the room, and Yeosang is pulling off his shirt. When San cocks his head, he laughs.

“Jongho is a messy eater.”

“I am _not! _He knows I'm not, he's seen me!” he protests, and San giggles. He squeezes Jongho's hand. Lets Jongho bring him to the bed, where Yeosang is reclined against the pillows, smiling fondly at both of them. It makes San's heart warm, even if it's not beating.

They each lay on one side of Yeosang. Jongho shows him how to tip Yeosang's head and hold it so there's room for him to bite, even though San already knows, and this is more like... Re-learning how to do something without the extra steps he's used to taking. San shivers when Yeosang wraps his arm around his shoulders, when Yeosang kisses the top of his head and murmurs that it's okay. It's okay, like it's been okay since he came here.

San mirrors Jongho's every action as Jongho tells him what to do. Pressing with his tongue to find the artery, biting in. Drinking slowly so Yeosang doesn't die too quickly, because it takes longer for him to come back up from that kind of death. A traumatic one.

San feels Yeosang's heartbeat in his teeth as he bites so very carefully, sucks tenderly, one hand on Yeosang's chest, digging in when his heart starts to slow, a little frightened like he always is. Like this time, Yeosang might not wake up again. His blood is sweet, though. Sweeter than it's ever been before and San doesn't know _why _but he's glad. He's glad it tastes better, that it doesn't taste like he remembers wine tasting like, and instead tastes like a slightly tart fruit juice, though he's not sure what made it change. It's not like they've really done anything different than usual? Maybe... Maybe whatever was messing him up was messing that up, too. Messing with his perspective, the way his senses interpreted things.

Jongho reaches to hold his hand. One of Yeosang's hands moves to rest on top of theirs. Even when he dies, that hand stays.

“Come on,” Jongho says, softly. “Lets get him cleaned up and tucked in.”

So San helps Jongho get Yeosang's limp body under the blankets, so he stays warm.

“It's gonna a while before he gets up, all the way drained like that,” Jongho says thoughtfully, standing a little uncomfortably. “So we can let him sleep a while, or I guess, you can sleep with him if you want.”

“What're you gonna do?”

“Um,” Jongho says, looking away. “Just. Gonna shower, maybe.” San narrows his eyes.

“Just shower?” he asks, looking down at Jongho's groin and giggling when Jongho makes a very embarrassed noise. “Don't be embarrassed! I mean think about what I was doing!”

“It's _embarrassing,_” Jongho mutters. “I hate it. I don't... I don't want him like that.” Jongho looks very... Young and vulnerable, for a moment. San cocks his head and says,

“Do you want me to fix it?”

“What?” Jongho asks, staring at him. San licks his lips, feels very thoughtful.

“Do you want me to fix it? Like you helped me before, I mean?”

Jongho's ears are flushed red with all the blood rushing to them, and San laughs.

“It's okay if you want me to!” he says. “I don't mind, promise.” He pauses. “But it's okay if you don't want me to, too. I didn't mean to make it weird.”

“I... I guess we can try it,” Jongho mumbles, rubbing at the back of his neck. “C'mon, though, not in here. Not when he could wake up.”

“You don't want him to see?” San asks, hopping up to follow Jongho to the second of three bedrooms. Not that either of them have slept anywhere but Yeosang's bed more than a handful of times. “Why?”

“I don't want him like that,” Jongho says. “I don't... I don't love him like that. I mean I love him, I love him so much, but not like that.” San smiles.

“You don't have to be embarrassed, Jongho. It's okay to not want him like that.” San doesn't know where the words come from, why they come. But they comfort Jongho, maybe. So San reaches out for his hand.

“It's okay to not want me like that, either! If you just want me to suck you off, that's fine!”

“You're _so loud,_” Jongho hisses, shoving San into the bedroom and closing the door.

“It's not like he's gonna wake up!” San laughs, but nudges Jongho toward the bed. “Go on, take your pants off and sit down.” Jongho doesn't move.

“What are you doing.”

“It's _embarrassing,_” Jongho mumbles, looking honestly uncomfortable, and San feels bad, like he's pressuring him. He doesn't mean to. But they've done this kind of thing before? Jongho has just laid there and let San grind against him like they're stupid teenagers, so why is he so embarrassed now?

“No it's not,” San assures him. “It's perfectly normal. Do you want me to get undressed too? Will that help?” Jongho bites his lip and nods, so San reaches to pull off his own clothes with no shame whatsoever. He's never been embarrassed about being nude, or mostly nude. It's comfortable. He doesn't see the problem.

But when he's undressed he turns and sees that Jongho is sitting on the edge of the bed, flushed, cock standing upright, thick and a little long just like he remembers. San licks his lips. He remembers this, too. Doing this, enjoying doing this. He just has to be careful of his teeth, he thinks. He doesn't want to hurt Jongho, especially not now, when he's clearly so nervous. That would be bad. And he's never done this with Jongho before, it's always just been San rubbing all up on him—so this is very different. Maybe that's why he's so nervous.

San gets on his knees between Jongho's muscular legs and pushes them apart. Jongho is blushing so deeply San is amazed that he's hard, honestly. Though he's still better fed and therefore in better health than San is, so maybe it's normal. San isn't hard at all, hasn't really gotten hard in months, but he still feels little shivers and pulses of pleasure as he drags his mouth over the insides of Jongho's thighs, giving soft little bites and watching Jongho slap a hand over his mouth as though to keep himself quiet.

“No,” San says, softly. “No, don't. I want to hear you, please?” Jongho swallows but nods, leaning back onto his hands, instead of hunching forward. “Tell me if something doesn't feel good or you want me to stop, okay? Promise?”

“Promise,” Jongho mumbles, and San kisses his thigh, smiling. He can't seem to stop smiling. Not even as he kisses his way up from Jongho's knees to his inner thighs, licking, biting, kissing until he comes to Jongho's erection. Then he gets up onto his knees a little higher and takes it into his mouth.

It's easier than he thought it would be to keep his teeth out of the way. And he doesn't have to breathe, so he can stay down and just rock himself back and forth, never pulling off, just—just sucking, his lips to Jongho's neatly trimmed pubic hair as Jongho pants and gasps above him, trying not to hunch over him, holding onto his hair but not hard. More like petting it, like he does when he's trying to comfort San after San's had a meltdown on top of him. This definitely feels different. Like it's more about pleasure than it is about taking care of San. Yeah, that's what it is, and it feels _amazing. _That he's pleasuring Jongho, instead of Jongho taking care of him, for once.

“San,” Jongho's breathing, even though he doesn't have to. “Oh shit, _shit, _San—”

San pulls back enough that he feels the hot burst of... Something that isn't quite semen but isn't exactly blood spill all over his teeth and the insides of his cheeks before he pushes all the way back down, the taste on his tongue, Jongho's girth comfortable in his throat. He stays there as Jongho shivers and jerks, clearly attempting to not shove up against San's face. He's a good boy, San thinks, even as he slowly draws off, making sure to slide his tongue up the underside when he pulls away from Jongho's cock with a soft, wet _pop. _He opens his mouth, so Jongho can see the remnants of his... His cum, there. San sticks out his tongue, grinning, then closes his mouth and swallows. Opens his mouth again and shows off his clean tongue and teeth, grinning with all the cheekiness he has. Which is a _lot_. Jongho is _so _embarrassed and San doesn't think he's seen anything that cute in ages.

“Oh my god, don't ever do that again, that's so gross—”

“I won't, I won't,” San promises, and means it. “But did you like it? It felt good?” Jongho looks away, flushed, and San smiles, resting one arm on Jongho's thigh.

“Don't be embarrassed Jongho, it's okay! I don't mind, I really do like it, and it's not like you have to marry me or something, I can just suck you off if you want me to. And I know you don't like kissing, so don't have to kiss! It's like, mm... A transaction? But like, not a bad one. A good one. Between friends!”

“Are... Are you sure?”

“Absolutely,” San nods. “It's okay if you just need to use me like that, I don't mind. You've let me use you before too, remember?” San grins, knocking Jongho's knee with his shoulder.

“And besides, it feels better than jerking off, right?” San asks, rubbing his hands up and down Jongho's bare thighs.

“What,” Jongho sounds breathless. He doesn't even _need _to breathe! But it's cute. Jongho is cute. “But what about you?” San shrugs, sitting up on his knees. He's not hard, but he'd had a feeling he wouldn't be. Not enough blood at the moment.

“I'm all set,” he says, smiling, getting up and moving away but still facing Jongho, so he can see San's soft cock. “Now, c'mon. We should get cleaned up and go to bed.”

“But,” Jongho says.

“I'm fine!” San laughs, pulling his underwear back on. “Hustle up, I wanna be in bed when his heart starts again.” It's one of San's favorite sounds, Yeosang's heart coming back to life. He still can't believe that Yeosang can't die, it's... It's like a dream come true, if he's honest. Someone he can feed from, someone he can't kill, someone who obviously cares for him? _Two _people who care for him? It's wonderful.

It makes San feel so good and so safe that he doesn't really think about how he feels like he's missing something—and he tries not to care about the possible reasons why.

> _It is December 21st, 2021._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, aged twenty years and eleven after._
> 
> _I woke to Jongho on one side, and San on the other. I haven't felt this good in a very long time._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you can find me on the bird app @iwriteausins, though it is a personal handle and thus contains a lot of personal/non kpop related things.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> enjoy~

> _It is May 5th, 2022._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, aged twenty years and eleven after._
> 
> _San continues to be plagued by nightmares. _

Yeosang wakes up because San is leaving the bedroom, one hand pressed to his head and the other making sure the door closes with as little noise as possible. Jongho sleeps on at Yeosang's side. This has been happening since last December, since Hongbin removed whatever magic had been wrapped around San's throat to silence him, and around his mind to confuse him and make him forget. He's remembering slowly, in bits and pieces.

San has been a vampire for longer than Jongho, and has been alive longer than Yeosang. Since the early 1980s. He had a maker, who owned a brothel. San worked for her both before and after his untimely (and very intentional) death. San was practically enslaved to her before she turned him and then, as a helpless fledgeling with no knowledge and no other way to learn, he _was _enslaved. She taught him how to give the bite under a glamour, under the disguise of pleasure, so it wouldn't be as noticeable. She never taught him anything else. Not him, or any of the other vampires under her 'care.' She traveled with them, moved them from city to city, collecting more vampires, men and women, to replace the elder ones when they started to be 'too numb to be of any use.' San had one friend there. Older. But not _old._ He couldn't remember his name just yet.

As time went on, San had said, he tried to rebel, tried to get away. He almost succeeded several times, only to be caught at the last second. He didn't like to talk about what happened after he got caught. It is his maker who effectively cursed him—made his mind foggy, tied his tongue. Even that didn't stop him from trying to get away. San remembered that when he became more trouble than he was worth, she drugged him unconscious, threw him in a dumpster in Queens, and left him there. That was in the late nineties.

San had been wandering since then. Finding hiding places in the day, walking in the dark. He used glamours to feed as little as possible, because his maker told him about Hunters, how he'd never last if he tried to fight them, so he didn't. He always ran, because he didn't want to get killed. He used his glamours and took a few sips here and there from people in bars or clubs or even out on the street under the guise of making out, or talking, or sex. He hid in dumpsters and in sewers and got thinner and thinner, fell more and more out of sanity, dropping literally out of his own mind because of the magic strangling him. Yeosang had been the first he'd taken so much from in a really long time. It woke him up a little, but only barely. And staying with Yeosang and Jongho has helped him come back to himself nearly entirely, and he always says he's so grateful for that.

But unfortunately nightmares, random bouts of tears, and long minutes of rocking himself back and forth in dark, quiet places come with the return of San's memories. Flinching and shaking and brave smiles, even though his eyes are full of red.

Yeosang doesn't try to force him to talk. He doesn't want to pressure San. But he also wants to help. It's a hard line to walk. San clearly wants to deal with his traumas and past himself, but Yeosang is afraid they might be drowning him. Yeosang doesn't know how to broach the subject, so he's caught in his own silence. It's terrible. Especially when it's like just now, when Yeosang wakes up to blood on his chest from San's tears and the way he bites at his own thumb, both to be quiet and to comfort himself. It's clear that San is more than used to comforting himself and now that he's back to his own mind, he doesn't try to come to Jongho or Yeosang like he would have before. No, he... Does what he's just done, and goes off by himself to hide and try to process whatever's bothering him.

“What do we do,” Yeosang hears Jongho beside him, whispering against his chest, no longer asleep. The shift in air pressure when the door opened and closed had probably woken him. “I wanna help him, Yeosang.”

“I don't think we can,” Yeosang murmurs into Jongho's hair. “Not until he wants to let us.”

Jongho huffs, and Yeosang smooths his hand up and down his shoulder.

It continues like this for weeks. Months. San doesn't talk about it, and Yeosang doesn't force him to. Comforts when he can, when San will let him. He watches Jongho try to stay close to San, hold his hand when they sleep. San still doesn't leave the apartment most days and when he does, it's only to follow Yeosang and visit Hongbin.

Yeosang is napping with Jongho on a warm May afternoon. It's getting to be uncomfortably close to summer, and the middays are unbearable. Most days they stay inside, adopting a nocturnal lifestyle out of dislike for the comparative heat and humidity.

But Yeosang is napping with Jongho on a warm May afternoon, and Yeosang knows that something is wrong the second he wakes. Something inside him feels empty. Hollow. He reaches for San's body, where he should be curled into Yeosang's right side, and finds nothing but cold sheets.

“San,” he croaks out, sitting up. “San?” Jongho groans, staying in the bed as Yeosang gets up, grabs the clothes he was wearing yesterday from the bathroom and hurries out into the rest of the apartment. He walks through the bathrooms, the bedrooms, the living room. He opens the living room balcony and every closet and when he finally goes to the foyer to put on shoes, he finds a note written in San's neat, tall script taped to the door.

_yeosang and jongho,_

_i hope you slept well! i'm sorry to leave like this. it's not because i don't want to stay. there's just something i have to do, and i don't want you to get all wrapped up in it! i'll be fine! and back before you know it! i'll be gone just long enough that when i get back jongho won't complain about my talking for a few days!_

_all my love and growing fonder every day, _

_san._

Yeosang licks his lips. Puts his shoes back down. Sits on the little step down into the entry and takes slow, steadying breaths through his hands cupped over his mouth. It's only been eight months but San has become... Part of his life. A very important part of his life, like Jongho has. To suddenly have him disappear is like... Taking a blow to the chest. Cracking his sternum. Yeosang feels... He feels _guilty, _he feels—if he'd only been able to help, if he'd—if he'd taken better care of San, if he'd been able to help him more, if he'd—he should have encouraged San to trust him with whatever was hurting him, he should have tried to—

Yeosang realizes he's crying. The soft, miserable, hiccuping kind that hasn't come out of him since he first came to New York, after Gunwoo passed into the Sleep. San is gone. San is gone, and Yeosang probably couldn't have done anything to stop him and he knows that, but—

But he wishes he'd taken the chance to try, anyway.

“Yeosang?” Comes Jongho's sleep-raspy voice, as he walks up behind Yeosang and sits behind him, his cheek to Yeosang's back. “What's wrong? Where's San?”

Yeosang chokes, pulls his knees up and puts his face against them. He hears Jongho lift the paper from the floor, hears him gasp, then feels him shiver. Feels him bury his face into the back of Yeosang's neck.

“Yeosang,” he says, whispering and afraid, his cheek on Yeosang's shoulder. “Yeosang, Yeosang.”

There's nothing Yeosang can do to comfort him but take his hand, clench it tightly, hold it against his chest. Kiss his knuckles, let him bite when he's cried so much he gets hungry. It's strange to get back into bed without San there to warm his right side. To giggle and tease Jongho until they both fall asleep. It's strange for a few days, then longer.

It's... Difficult to continue normal life without San's laughter, his constant presence, his smile, smirk and lewd commentary to make Jongho blush and Yeosang smack his belly. The apartment feels quiet and as the days drag into weeks, which crawl into months, Yeosang tries to force himself to stop waiting up, just to see if San will come. Tries to stop wondering about when he's coming home. Tries not to miss him every time he pulls on his favorite blue sweater, the one with blood stains on the collar because San drank from him and spilled a little in his excitement. When he smells flowers as he walks past a florist. He tries not to think of San every time he lets Jongho bite and feels him reach across his body to hold a hand that isn't there.

It's a bone-deep ache. Like missing Gunwoo, still asleep, according to Taekwoon's bi-yearly updates. But at least the pain of missing Gunwoo has dulled a little, with time.

Missing San feels like missing a piece of his chest. He feels that it's not there every day.

In the blink of an eye, five months have passed.

San still hasn't come home.

> _It is October 28th, 2022._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, aged twenty years and twelve after._
> 
> _San has not returned._


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> no major warnings here! enjoy~

> _It is December 5th, 2022._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, aged twenty years and twelve after._
> 
> _Our days pass in silence. Jongho eats less and less. _

Jongho and Yeosang are out tonight. They walk, holding hands through the dark of Central Park even though they're not supposed to be there. The frosty grass and leaves crunch lightly underfoot. The paths are quiet, the moon is full. Everything smells like the kiss of winter though there's no real snow on the ground yet. Their lives, which were quiet before San, have now regressed into near-silence. There's nothing to say, really. They exchange their _I love yous _and hold one another gently, but half their lives are missing. The space San has left is an empty chasm that stretches through both of them. Nothing is going to fix that.

Though Jongho is eating less, going out less, Yeosang feels closer to him than ever before. They have lost someone together and that mourning, while slowly dulling, has drawn them even closer together. It seems strange, because San has only been gone seven months but there is a space he is meant to fill, Yeosang can... _Feel _that. He can feel that the space can only be occupied by San, that he is meant to be there with them.

“I think he would like this,” Jongho says, smiling a little. “Being where we're not supposed to be in the middle of the night.”

“He's a troublemaker,” Yeosang agrees. It helps that they haven't stopped speaking about San in the present tense. Not like he's still here, but like they have confidence he's coming back. They don't have much, but to pretend they do makes the loss less difficult. “He'd probably want to climb a tree or stalk after one of the guards for fun.”

Jongho snickers, smiling. “He absolutely would.”

They keep holding hands as they walk all the way through the park, and then back toward the apartment complex, where they've lived together for over two years. They're about five blocks away from it when Yeosang stops walking, jerking, heart seizing and hair hanging in his eyes.

“Yeosang?” Jongho asks, and Yeosang closes his eyes to feel, to feel that familiar, thrumming little thread of magic. It's weak and there's something else wrapped around it, something rougher but he can feel it, he can feel—

“Come on,” he says, breathless, running, running as fast as his human lungs allow. He can feel it, he knows that magic, has felt it before, has missed it so desperately—

“San,” Yeosang calls from down the hall, able to see him, sitting at the door, practically collapsed against it. Jongho beats Yeosang to him, and the alarm on his face makes Yeosang's heart scream.

“San,” Jongho's voice is shaking. “San wake up, wake up—”

_No, _Yeosang thinks. _No, oh please no. _

Next to San is another vampire. Ragged looking, eyes closed. He's the source of the other thread of magic, wrapped around San's, and Yeosang can see that the two of them have bite marks on their necks and the insides of their elbows. They've been feeding from one another? For how long? That's not safe, it can't be done for too long, more than a month and a half and it becomes toxic, vampires aren't meant to survive on one another—

“Help me get them inside,” Yeosang breathes, pressing his ID card to the lock of the apartment and shoulders the door open, trying to lift the new vampire up from the floor while Jongho clutches San to his chest. Yeosang and Jongho manage to get the two of them inside. Jongho lays San out on the floor, touching his cheek, shaking his shoulders.

“San,” he whispers, hair in his eyes as Yeosang lays the stranger down. “San, San wake up, San—”

“He needs to feed,” Yeosang breathes, urging Jongho to move. “Bring me the knife.”

Yeosang keeps what he calls his 'bleeding knife' in the kitchen. It's excruciatingly sharp, with a wide, pointed, double-sided blade only about a half-inch long. But a push into his carotid artery is enough. It will cause him to bleed.

Jongho runs, skids onto his knees when he brings it back, holding San's head against his thighs as Yeosang holds the knife to his throat and all but punches it into his skin. He immediately starts to bleed.

San jerks up, eyes wild and frenzied, and latches on to Yeosang with a ferocity Yeosang has never felt from him. San's bite has always been gentle, and now—now his teeth are bruising Yeosang's neck, splitting the wound further open, swallowing his blood at an alarming rate. Jongho reaches as though to yank San off and Yeosang shakes his head, cradles the back of San's head.

“No,” he gasps out, fading fast. “No let him—and the other—as much as it takes—”

“Okay,” Jongho nods, clearly worried as Yeosang feels himself dropping off, dying faster than San has ever killed him before. When he gasps back to life he is killed again almost immediately—hears Jongho shouting but he's too dizzy to understand the words.

It happens over and over. Yeosang loses track. He wakes up a little slower every time, though—not given enough time to fully recover between deaths. His mind is awash with visions of dark hair, light hair. Fevered and aggressive bites turning into gentle bites that are more like kisses. Eventually the biting stops. The frantic feeding stops. Yeosang wakes in his bed, blankets pulled up to his chin. He is in his bed and on either side of him are Jongho and San, and behind San is the other vampire, curled around him like a small child.

Yeosang's head is spinning. He tries to ground himself, steady himself by reaching to hold San and Jongho's hands, intertwined on his chest. He wants to cry. But instead he turns his head to the right and feels his lips hit San's hair, his forehead, like they haven't in more than half a year.

“Welcome home,” he breathes out in a whisper. San jerks up, staring down at him and immediately starts crying, laughing, bending down to press kisses all over Yeosang's face even though his tears means there is blood all over Yeosang's skin.

“Yeosang,” he says, between licking kisses to clean up his mess. “Yeosang, Yeosang I'm sorry, I didn't mean to take so long, it wasn't supposed to take so long—”

“Shh,” Yeosang says, urging him back down. “You can... Can tell me later, San. Sleep now. I'm so tired.”

San sniffles and nods, tucking himself in a little closer, his arm under Yeosang's shoulder, his nose pressed to Yeosang's collarbone. He's breathing, even though he doesn't have to. Yeosang is lulled to sleep by the sound. It's like a... A dream come true. Almost on par with Gunwoo coming out from his Sleep.

Yeosang jerks up with a screaming rush of adrenaline and a gasp of fear at the sound of a shriek and the force of Jongho throwing himself off the bed, the sound of the curtains being yanked closed, th rings scraping across the rod. The room is plunged into darkness and Yeosang sits up further, disoriented. Curtains, darkness, last night, San. San, his companion, the new vampire whose name Yeosang doesn't know yet. The new vampire. He won't have the charms, Yeosang thinks, muddled. He won't be able to stay in the sun. The curtains had been open. Jongho has closed them.

“Wooyoung?” San is asking, his voice high and worried. “Wooyoung, come on, get—it's okay, get up, it's okay now, Jongho closed the curtains, let Yeosang wake up and—”

“I'm up,” Yeosang mumbles, leaning forward and pressing a hand to his head, shaking it. “Wooyoung?”

“My friend,” San says, whimpering. “Wooyoung, Wooyoung come on, you're burned, you need to feed—”

“But,” comes a voice, high like San's but raspier. Frightened.

_Maybe this is my mission._

Yeosang looks around the dim room. San is on the side of the bed opposite the windows, trying to comfort a young man with light hair. He keeps talking, like if he stops the boy will be even more frightened.

“Wooyoung,” Yeosang says, keeping his voice calm and even, just as he had with Jongho and San. “Wooyoung, it's okay. The windows are covered, you're all right. Come up here, let me feed you.”

It takes another few moments, but San and Yeosang manage to coax Wooyoung up onto the bed properly. He is burned badly, across the top of his arm and hand. He'd been sleeping with his arm over San's body. Yeosang leans back, offers out his hand. “Come here,” he says, very gently. “I'll feed you.”

“Like last night?” Wooyoung asks, and Yeosang nods.

“Like last night.”

“Don't glamour him, Wooyoung,” San says hurriedly. “He doesn't need it. Just be gentle, don't hurt him.” Wooyoung nods at the instructions, carefully getting up onto the bed and straddling Yeosang's hips. He looks down at him, unsure, then pushes his unburned arm under Yeosang's shoulders, pulls him up. Yeosang leaves his head tipped back. Wooyoung is strong as Jongho. Maybe even stronger.

“It's fine,” Yeosang says, his eyes closed. “It's fine, Wooyoung. Eat.”

Wooyoung's bite is just as gentle as San's usually is. His teeth are long and sharp. The way he sucks, it's like he's trying to give Yeosang a hickey. Yeosang remembers how San told him how he glamours people—fools them into thinking they're just making out, or having sex. Wooyoung seems to be using the same tactics, not that it bothers Yeosang. Not even as he starts to slip away and Wooyoung lowers him down, staying close to him, continuing to suck at the bite, pressing and rubbing his tongue to it like he's kissing into Yeosang's mouth. Yeosang's deaths the night before had been much more difficult than this.

Yeosang wakes to the sound of Wooyoung and San talking quietly with Jongho.

“—ta? That's where you were?” Jongho asks.

“Yeah,” San sounds ashamed of himself. “I just. I didn't think it was was gonna take so long, but finding them was hard, and then when I found them getting Wooyoung _out _was hard, and then I forgot Wooyoung can't move during the day, so that made it worse, but—”

“We fed from each other for a lot of it, especially that last leg up 95.” Wooyoung says. “We were... It was really hard. We were so hungry, but it was too risky. There were still Hunters to deal with, nevermind the Madam, and _she _chased us all the way up to Baltimore.”

“Christ,” Jongho sighs. “Well. I'm glad you made it here. God, San, we were so _worried._ Yeosang was a wreck.”

“So were you,” Yeosang rasps out, smiling as he pushes himself up. “San.”

“Yeosang,” San says, almost whimpering as he crawls over Yeosang and hugs him around the shoulders, shivering. He smells like soap and himself and Yeosang has missed him so, so badly. “Yeosang I'm sorry, I didn't mean to stay gone for so long, I'm sorry—I didn't think it all the way through, I didn't really plan—and then Wooyoung was—”

“It's my fault,” Wooyoung said, sitting down on the bed, in a pair of Jongho's pajamas now, skin and hair clean. Yeosang must have slept through them showering. His hair is a soft lavender color. His skin is a warm, golden tan. “It's my fault, I.”

“It _wasn't,_” San says, fierce. “It took me a million years to find you and she was torturing you. That's not your fault, Wooyoung. Never your fault.”

Wooyoung looks away, and Yeosang reaches out to touch his face. He's a handsome boy, Yeosang thinks. With an interesting nose and a full mouth and beautiful brown eyes.

“Wooyoung,” he says, and he smiles when the vampire looks over at him, embarrassed and shy. “It's nice to meet you. I'm Yeosang.”

“Yeah, I...” Wooyoung nods. “I know. San told me.”

“We'll see Hongbin, once the sun goes down.” Yeosang sighs, laying back into the pillows. “We'll get you... The charms you need.”

“You don't even know me,” Wooyoung says, sounding confused at Yeosang's lack of suspicion.

“San does,” Yeosang says. “San does, and he's my charge. I trust him. He brought you here, and so...” Yeosang smiles, rubbing his thumb against Wooyoung's prominent cheekbone. “And so you are also my charge.”

Wooyoung looks like he's going to cry.

“You need to stop collecting kids. I'm gonna start feeling neglected,” Jongho mutters, and Yeosang smacks him on the arm as strongly as he can with his free hand. Jongho is smirking, though. Brat.

“I will collect as many kids as I damned well please,” he says. He hesitates, reaches to tuck back a lock of Jongho's dark hair and reclines back into the headboard and his pillows.

“I'm pretty sure this is my reason to live, you know.” Yeosang doesn't know why he feels the need to explain. Maybe he just wants them all to understand that he's not just doing this for fun or for his own satisfaction but that it's something he wants, something he _needs. _

“People like me... Go mad if we don't have a reason to keep living, and I think. I think taking care of people like you is why I'm here. So you're my charge, Wooyoung,” Yeosang smiles at him again. Wooyoung smiles back, very shyly, and when his eyes curve up, the tears slide down his cheeks.

“You're my charge, and I'm going to take care of you.”

“...thank you,” Wooyoung whispers, reaching up to hold Yeosang's hand harder against his face, pressing his cheek into Yeosang's palm. “Th. Thank you, I. I never thought San would—I mean I didn't think he'd come back for me, I thought he was dead—”

“But here you are,” Yeosang offers. “Here you are, and here San is, safe and sound. So try not to dwell on it too much for now, okay? Please, get comfortable around the house, feel free to do as you like. I'm... I'm going back to sleep. We'll go see Hongbin tonight?”

Jongho nods, and takes San and Wooyoung by the hands to pull them into the living room, though they leave the bedroom door open.

Yeosang is lulled to sleep by the sound of their quiet talking, a comforting wave of white noise washing away the remnants of miserable silence.

> _It is December 7h, 2022._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, aged twenty years and twelve after._
> 
> _San has come home, and brought with him, Wooyoung. I know, now, that this is my mission. _
> 
> _This is why I am what I am._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> of course san had to go back to save wooyoung!  
enjoy the gentle double update!


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> where was san for those seven months, anyway?

> Mid-October, 2022

San hadn't meant to be gone this long. It wasn't supposed to take this long!

But then it had taken a _million years _to find them, playing hide-and-seek with Hunters and other, less social vampires to keep himself from getting killed, and once he'd _found _them in Atlanta it had taken longer still to find a moment when he could sneak in without being seen and rescue his best friend. He'd known, going into this, that he wouldn't be able to save anyone else. But he had to save Wooyoung. Not saving him wasn't an option. He couldn't leave him with the Madame, because she—because she was evil_, _she was cruel_, _and Wooyoung was good and warm and lovely. He didn't deserve anything she did to him, what she had been doing to him for longer than San had been alive.

It had been tricky, finding a building that technically doesn't exist. But getting the window open had been easy. Getting Wooyoung unattached from the restraints that held him to the floor of his prison had been a little more difficult, but still manageable. They almost hadn't made it out, though. San had to hide in the bathroom as the Madam walked by, passing through the hallway with measured, clicking steps in her tall stiletto shoes.

But he has Wooyoung. He has Wooyoung now, and they're running and hiding, because Wooyoung can't run during the day. Right now they're in a basement apartment in an abandoned building in Atlanta. They're both so tired. San can feel Wooyoung shaking with exhaustion and hunger, but he's afraid that if they start to feed on someone, they'll kill them, and that would leave a trail for a Hunter to follow, and there's no Yeosang here to save him if everything goes wrong. Better safe than sorry.

So San bites people as cautiously as he can, then lets Wooyoung bite him, lets Wooyoung suck him off to get whatever that weird fluid they orgasm is—their bodies produce it, instead of taking it from humans, so it's got to have at least a little of the nourishment they need. Not enough, but it's better than nothing, so San returns the favor. They bite at one another, desperate and even more scared as they make their way up Route 95, having to take side roads sometimes, because she's following them, chasing them, out of nothing more than horrible spite, probably. Maybe she wants to kill them. San doesn't know.

But Baltimore. They make it to Baltimore and she gives up as they slide into the sewers and disappear. They manage to pounce a group of homeless people at an open space near the ocean—San has to stop Wooyoung from killing any of them, convincing him instead to take small mouthfuls, just enough to coat their bellies, just enough to last until they get to New York. They share that blood between them when that attack puts Hunters on their six, and they have to be even _more _slow, more cautious and careful.

“San,” Wooyoung whimpers, hand on his belly, exhausted and gaunt and miserable. “_San._”

“Almost there,” San promises. They're in the right borough. They're so close, they're almost home. Even if Yeosang and Jongho aren't home, they will be soon. Yeosang doesn't like to stay out overnight, so he'll come home even if Jongho doesn't.

San staggers up the back stairs, holding Wooyoung's hand, dragging him behind. The door to the apartment is locked. Wooyoung whines, pathetic, and San shakes his head, collapsing to his knees, then back against the door.

“He'll come home,” San says, shaking with exhaustion, with hunger, with relief. “He'll. he'll co. come home.”

Then San is gone, unconscious until the smell of blood. The bite. Vicious and uncaring, he's _starving, _Wooyoung is _starving. _He hears Jongho, but can't really _hear _him, not even when the blood stops flowing then starts again, over and over until...

San has no idea how many times he's killed Yeosang, oh god Yeosang—but they're in bed. They're in Yeosang's bed and San is drowning in Yeosang's scent, the taste of his blood and skin. Jongho is holding his hand, and Yeosang's heartbeat is the most wonderful thing he's heard in what feels like a million years.

He's home, he's home, he's home—with Wooyoung safe behind him, Yeosang and Jongho in front, and he's never been so happy. He's home, with all the people he loves, and he's safe, and it's like being found by Yeosang all over again, when he was bleeding to death in that alley, cornered by Hunters, and Yeosang saved him, pressed a hand to his slit throat, _feed, you need to feed. _

“i love you,” San croaks out in the smallest whisper he can manage, pressing himself closer, hating to cry because it costs him blood, but what else is he supposed to do when he's so full of joy he might burst? “i love you, i love you, i'm home.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please forgive the lack of detail? i thought they made the chapter too long/boring T^T  
see you soon!


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> some.... plot.

> _It is December 8th, 2022._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, _ _aged twenty years and twelve after._
> 
> _I think that Hongbin is making fun of me. _ _He's started calling me 'Father Deathless.' _ _I'm sure he thinks he's funny. _

Normally, when Hongbin sees this kind of thing—an immortal starting to fixate, _any _kind of magical being starting to fixate—he tries to stop it somehow. He attempts to reason with them, or use a spell to make them see sense if the case is severe enough. It's a foolish thing, but Hongbin doesn't like to see their kind suffer. Or see them set themselves up to suffer.

But what Hongbin is seeing with Yeosang is so singular that he can't even think of a way to tell him to stop. And he's not sure that he wants to. Not when Yeosang brought Jongho, or when he brought San. And not tonight, as Yeosang walks in with yet another vampire in his little... Family, Hongbin supposes. They must view one another as a family. Yeosang takes care of all of them, keeps them fed, safely housed, away from harm. And they clearly care for him very deeply—it's obvious to Hongbin, who can read Jongho's stoney face and San's expressive body like books. He's been alive a long time. He knows how to see these things. He knows how to _See _these things.

Yeosang asks Hongbin to give his new charge—Wooyoung—the same charms as San and Jongho. He can pay, so Hongbin gives them. Sometimes he thinks it might be bad business, working with vampires like this. But they're better than Hunters. Hongbin wouldn't serve a Hunter if they were begging on their knees, bleeding out all over his floor. They could be burning to death at his feet and he wouldn't piss to put them out.

So Hongbin provides Yeosang and Wooyoung with what they need. He chides San for being gone for so long, then ruffles his hair to prove he's not angry when San pouts and scuffs his boot against the floor.

The three vampires proceed to look around the store curiously, and Hongbin turns to Yeosang, who is watching them with so much care and affection it makes Hongbin's heart ache. No, there is no way he could or would ever tell Yeosang to stop what he's doing. Not when it's obviously making him feel useful, not when it's making him so happy. He'd been so miserable when he arrived in New York. He'd almost never smiled, he'd barely spoken. So different than he is now.

“So, Father Deathless,” Hongbin says. “You have three children now.” Yeosang rolls his eyes, but there is the kiss of a smile at the corner of his mouth.

“I do,” he says, arms wrapped around himself.

“I've heard...” Hongbin has been wondering whether or not he should tell Yeosang about this. Because it's not only that the circumstances are different, but the situations are so _similar. _“I've heard word of another immortal. Doing what you are.”

Yeosang turns to look at him. “What?”

“He takes care of vampires,” Hongbin says, watching the three young creatures move about the shop, pointing out curios and laughing and nudging one another just like the regular human 20-somethings do when they come in. “Just like you do. He lives in New Orleans. One of my friends was talking about him a few days ago.” He pauses, presses his lips together.

“Apparently he's got two kids of his own. I thought you might want to head down there to meet him. You've been here a while—won't hurt for you to travel some.”

Yeosang gives Hongbin a considering look, and Hongbin quirks his eyebrow.

“You can't tell me you're still in love with New York, Yeosang.”

“I am,” Yeosang says, and his smile is so gentle. How Yeosang can still smile like that when he's got _three _vampires following him around like imprinted baby ducks, Hongbin has no idea.

“Well. I... Know someone, who owns a store down there. I'll give you his address, anyway. If you decide you want to find the guy, he'll know where to point you.”

“Is there anything you think I'll need?” Yeosang asks, and Hongbin knows he isn't talking about charms or spells or tools.

“You've never met someone like you except Gunwoo, right?” Yeosang hugs himself more tightly. Hongbin hates that he has to ask. Any mention of Yeosang's mentor makes him clam up tighter than a nun's legs, makes this horrible little flower of hurt bloom in his eyes.

“No,” Yeosang says, and it's a little strangled. “No, I haven't.”

“Well,” Hongbin says, licking his lips. “You should bring a new book. You're almost done with the one you have, right?” He reaches under the counter for the book he's been saving specifically _for _Yeosang. Hongbin knows that Gunwoo has always been a little obsessed with saving his memories, especially since he'd lost them—or had been losing them—so quickly in the last couple hundred years, and certainly within the laat fifty, when they'd known one another.

The book is matte, forest green leather. The paper is thick and smooth. It cost Hongbin... Well. Not a lot of money, he doesn't deal in money for these kinds of things. But it's important enough that he hadn't minded the cost.

“Here,” he offers it out to Yeosang, who takes it and then immediately drops it onto the counter, staring at it. “What?”

“That...” Yeosang takes a shuddering breath. “That's magical.”

“It is,” Hongbin says. “I didn't know you could sense that kind of thing.”

“Well, I thought... I was able to sense—sense the _kids,_” he smiles. “I see little threads of magic, sometimes. I didn't know if I could sense anything else.”

“Well, you're right, it's magical. It's got never-end pages.” Hongbin smiles at Yeosang's confused expression. “You'll never have to get another. It'll always have new pages for you. It'll never get thicker, it'll never get wet, or get lost. I've tuned it to you, specifically. It's _your _book, Yeosang. So you can stop writing in Gunwoo's.”

Yeosang gives him a look so full of pitiable hurt that Hongbin wishes he hadn't said it but it _needed _to be said. Yeosang needs to let Gunwoo go—otherwise his buried-but-still-present fixation on his Sleep is going to make what's coming up more difficult than it's already going to be. Hongbin has _Seen _how difficult it could be, has felt it like a stone in his gut in the months San has been gone. He'd also Seen that San would come back, though he hadn't been able to tell Yeosang that, either. It would have hurt him more than San's absence did, the terrible months of waiting. And Hongbin hadn't Seen the condition in which San would come back, so he didn't dare risk it.

“Take these, too. In case you need them.” He pushes a box toward Yeosang, places it on top of the book.

“What are they?”

“Charms,” Hongbin says. “I think you should have them. Feel it, maybe.”

Yeosang gives him a suspicious look, but picks up the box and book. The kids come to Yeosang's gentle call—they each have a little curio they want to get, and Yeosang indulges them because he's a soft touch for them and Hongbin waves goodbye as Jongho leads Yeosang, San, and Wooyoung—the newest kid—out into the cold.

Hongbin gives a harsh breath out. He hopes they leave New York. Yeosang needs to be in New Orleans. He can feel the dreams and visions crawling all over him like the skittering of beetles legs and he shakes his head and hands to get the feeling off.

He waves his fingers at the door, which locks itself and turns the sign to _closed. _Another wave puts out the lights, and he walks upstairs very slowly, feeling ill. He hadn't wanted to push it. But Yeosang needs to go to New Orleans, he _needs _to be there. Hongbin has no idea why, just that his dreams have been dark and menacing and the paralysis demon that sometimes hovers above him when he Sees hasn't been willing to let go of Hongbin when he woke for the last three days. It hung over him, all red skin and teeth with its hands around Hongbin's neck to choke him just enough to make breathing hard, only releasing him when the sunlight pierced through the window of his bedroom.

“You told him?” The ghost in his kitchen asks, and Hongbin nods, not bothering to speak more on the subject. The ghost follows him all the way to his bedroom, stopping in the doorframe. Hongbin reaches the bed and swallows.

“Yoongi,” he whispers. “Will you stay with me tonight.”

“Of course,” the ghost says. He came with the shop; he's a good companion. A little obnoxious, but all good ghosts are. They need to be, if they want people to pay attention to them. But most of the time he's all right. Hongbin likes him, and is glad that he's here right now. Yoongi's presence—as a pure spirit, not an evil one—will keep the demon at bay. Hongbin is glad Yoongi is here, because the thought of waking up alone, trapped again in sleep paralysis and Seeing all the evil coming is too horrifying. Hongbin doesn't think he'll be able to handle it, not again, not after three days of terrible nightmares about what's going to happen if Yeosang _doesn't_ go down south. Not again, when he knows he can't _tell _Yeosang, because that's not the way the magic works. He can't say things like that. He can't make the decision to change someone's fate like that, the words never make it off his tongue no matter how much he wants them to.

Hongbin hopes Yeosang looks in the book. Hopes that his vague and scribbled notes, Jaehwan's address, will help him. He hopes Yeosang goes down to New Orleans, because undeserved Hell is going to come down on him, if he doesn't.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i hope you're all staying safe as you can!  
(this is the last, i guess... well, second to last, prewritten update? the rest are kind of in pieces but i'll try to keep a stable update schedule. take care of yourselves as much as you are able!)


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> meet (most of) the rest of the fam!
> 
> graphic sex in this one!

> _January 23rd, 2023._
> 
> _I don't see why I have to keep a record of this nonsense. It's not like Seonghwa or Mingi can forget, but Jaehwan insists. Has been insisting for years, actually, so I'm finally doing it. Maybe he'll get off my case. _
> 
> _My name is Jeong Yunho. I've been alive since 1850, and I have no intention of falling into the Sleep any time soon. _

Yunho sighs as Mingi complains about being hungry. Again. Mingi is _always _hungry. Not that Yunho really minds, but he does mind the way Mingi is currently sprawled out on top of him like some kind of small child. Mingi is six feet and two inches tall, and weighs a hundred and eighty pounds. He is _not _a small child.

“Get _off _me,” Yunho grunts, shoving Mingi to the other side of the bed and sitting up, throwing off his blankets. “Sweet lord above, you are not _starving._”

Mingi at least has the decency to look sheepish.

“You've been asleep for a long time,” he says, chewing his lip anxiously, making himself bleed a little. “I got scared.”

Yunho curses Jaehwan up one side and down the other. Ever since he'd spoken to Yunho about the Sleep in the presence of his partners, Mingi is constantly afraid that Yunho's going to pass into it and leave him and Seonghwa alone forever, or some other such nonsense. Yunho has explained to him _several times _that he has nothing to worry about, that because Yunho has Mingi and Seonghwa, he's not going to go to Sleep. Nothing has convinced Mingi though. It would adorable if it wasn't so infuriating.

“I _promise,_” Yunho says, heaving a sigh and letting Mingi snuggle up to him, despite his positively huge body. “I promise that nothing is going to happen to me. Or to you. Or to us, in general, all right? Now. How hungry are you, mm? Snack or meal.”

“Snack,” Mingi pouts, and Yunho ruffles his hair, offers his elbow, his soft inner arm. It's where Mingi prefers to feed from, when he doesn't need to be fully replenished. Mingi killing Yunho doesn't happen often—Mingi, unlike Seonghwa, prefers to take what they call 'snacks' every couple of days, instead of a 'meal' every couple of weeks, or once a month.

Mingi's bite doesn't hurt, but it doesn't feel good, either. It's like a sting. Like a hornet sting without the welt. Mingi tries to keep it from happening—licks at Yunho's skin over and over and over until it's numb before he bites, though there's always a bit of muscle ache afterward. It's sweet how Mingi fusses over it, but it's probably why he prefers snacks and not meals. He wouldn't be able to control how much pain Yunho is in if he couldn't bite in such an easy place.

Seonghwa, on the other hand, has a bite like nothing Yunho'd ever felt before in his life.

He imagines it must be what smoking a joint is like, from what his friends have told him, or had told him, in the sixties. Seonghwa's bite makes him all... Smeary and sleepy and too light, untethered from the earth and floating. It's not a bad feeling. Just a strange one. A very bizarre escape, and a temporary one.

Yunho has never felt the urge to flee or leave his existence. Jaehwan has told him how strange that is, but given that Seonghwa is the one who killed Yunho in the first place, he hasn't felt the need to separate from him. First because of Seonghwa's confusion and tiny bit of guilt over killing Yunho in the first place, but then because they'd grown fonder of one another over the years. Very fond indeed.

The kind of fond that makes Mingi pretend to vomit all over the kitchen floor, even though he engages affectionately and sexually with them both on a regular basis.

Yunho had found _Mingi _a mere two days after Mingi's 'rebirth' —as his so-called 'sire' had called it—in 2009. That was all the sire told Mingi, because Mingi had been alone and terrified when Yunho found him, appearing smaller than he had any right to be, tucked up beside a dumpster in a cardboard refrigerator box that barely contained his body but kept him out of the direct rays of the sun. At that point he'd been burned all over, like he hadn't been prepared for what the sun was going to do to him. Because he wasn't. And Yunho had hated how Mingi cried because he was so scared, and confused, and he'd only been here on a spring break trip for university, and he didn't know where his friends were, or how long it had been since he'd been... Killed. Yunho only found out later, when he was looking at the news online, about the disappearance of one Mingi Song while on a spring break trip from Sacramento, California and how his body was never found. He's never mentioned it to Mingi himself.

Yunho hated how Mingi had been horrified at the sight and taste of his own tears, the bloody smears all over his hands and face as he frantically tried to wipe them away and only wept more when he couldn't. He'd screamed and wailed and pressed his head into Yunho's shoulder, trying to make himself small despite his height and width. He'd been so, so afraid.

It was lucky that Yunho had Seonghwa. Luckier still that Seonghwa, who was a bit aloof at times, hadn't minded Yunho taking Mingi in, hadn't minded teaching Mingi all he needed to know. He was even a little fond of Mingi, Yunho thought, even in the beginning. Teasing him, ruffling his hair, cupping his face and speaking softly to soothe him when Mingi remembered what he was and shuddered in self-loathing and anxiety.

At least Hunters have long since been driven out of New Orleans. No, there is nothing here to cull magical beings, good or bad, which has its disadvantages, but its advantages are greater. Yunho had heard what happened to Lee Hongbin's lover up in New York, when Hunters got their hands on him in the mid nineties. Lee Hongbin's rage and grief had given birth to a terrifying storm in January of 1996, burying New York in snow and apparently he hadn't cared whether or not the city stayed that way, because it spiked again in February. Twice. Jaehwan said _that_ had been the result of a council of Hunters coming to charge Hongbin with murder—as though their laws would have any effect on a witch. Hongbin had simply made sure they regretted the decision. He had apparently killed fifteen of them with straight, violent magic, and who knew how many more with the cold.

Not long after that, the New Orleans witches came together to make sure there would be no Hunting in their city. Any disasters were caused by nature herself, and nothing else.

_He never really recovered, _Jaehwan had said, looking down at the letter in his hands. _Sometimes he just... Destroys New York just because he can. Because he's still angry. I don't blame him. He'd been with Gongchan and... And the others for over a hundred years, at that point. _Jaehwan had pursed his lips.

_That doesn't give him the right to do that, _Yunho had argued. Jaehwan's bright orange eyes pierced him.

_Imagine losing Seonghwa, Yunho. Brutally. Imagine finding him murdered, bloody and broken and violated on the steps of your home, the home you shared with him. Now, imagine that you had the ability to ruin the people who killed him in any way you chose. You cannot tell me that you would not raze the city in revenge._

Jaehwan was right, of course, but that didn't make Yunho any more comfortable with it. So they generally avoided talking about Lee Hongbin.

But as Mingi licks away Yunho's bite, the phone rings. Yunho reaches with his free arm, but Seonghwa picks it up first. He brings it into the bedroom, smiling at Yunho and carding his fingers through Mingi's hair as he passes off the phone.

“Hello?” Yunho asks.

“Hey,” Jaehwan says, sounding agitated. “Listen, I've got some people coming down from New York and—”

“And what does that have to do with me?”

“Will you ever let me finish a sentence? He's like you, apparently.”

Yunho pauses.

“What do you mean, he's like me?”

“He's like you,” Jaehwan says. “He's an immortal, with vampire companions. Three of them.”

Yunho takes in a hard, steady breath. He's never met another immortal like himself before—one with companions like his. He knows they _must _exist, because Jaehwan has told him so, but he's never _met _one.

“...When are they coming?” he asks.

“In a couple of days, probably,” Jaehwan says. “My contact says someone gave them the idea, and they've been sitting on it for a couple of weeks.”

“What does Hongbin have to do with it,” Yunho asks, voice sharp, because this is how Jaehwan always speaks around the subject, as though trying not to say Hongbin's name.

“My contact just says he's Seen what happens if they don't come, and it's infinitely worse than what will happen if they do,” Jaehwan says, sighing. “No matter how much you don't like him, Yunho, no one can deny that he has the Sight. He knows.”

Yunho does know. Yunho knows that the only thing Hongbin can't See is his own future, the future of those closest to him. It is the cruelest trick of fate, and the only reason Hongbin hadn't known about what was going to happen to Gongchan.

“All right,” Yunho says. “I'll take it into consideration.”

“That's all I ask,” Jaehwan says, sounding pleased. “I'll contact you again when they arrive.”

“All right.”

Yunho hangs up the phone and purses his lips together. Another immortal, with three vampire companions. Incredible. Yunho has never thought about meeting someone like him again, not after the first time (which had left a very bad taste in his mouth,) but. Maybe it will be good? It probably will be. Yunho knows, deep in his heart, that Hongbin would never allow any harm to come to him or his companions—that despite Hongbin's anger, he is a good person, and tries so hard to keep others from suffering the pain that he has. It's hard for Yunho to reconcile the man who gave him the charms for Seonghwa and Mingi—gave them freely, because he knew Yunho didn't have the means to purchase them and had subsequently refused any attempt at payment after—with the man who destroyed New York in desperate, agonized fury.

“What is it,” Seonghwa asks, even though he definitely heard the conversation. He's always so polite. Or pretends to be.

“Hongbin is sending down another immortal,” Yunho says. “One with vampire companions.” Seonghwa blinks at him.

“That's... That's a good thing, isn't it?” he asks, and Yunho nods, slowly.

“Probably. I'm not... I don't have any bad feelings about it. I'm just wondering why.”

“Did Jaehwan know?”

“He said Hongbin Saw something. I didn't ask what.” Yunho lays back in bed, staring at the ceiling and taking in the information.

“I suppose we'll find out when he gets here. You are letting him come, are you not?”

Yunho hates it when Seonghwa gets like that. Like he he wouldn't _dream _of Yunho being impolite enough to refuse meeting someone like himself. It gets Yunho every time, even if he hadn't been planning on inviting the other immortal into his home.

“Of course,” Yunho says, shifting and looking up at Seonghwa, exasperated. Seonghwa's dark hair is falling in his eyes, and he leans down to kiss Yunho on the mouth, to bite gently at his bottom lip.

“You guys are so gross,” Mingi complains, pushing away from the bed and brushing off his shirt. “I'm going out! Don't be having sex with I get back!!”

Seonghwa laughs against Yunho's lips, moves to be straddling him over the blankets as Mingi closes the bedroom door. Yunho smiles up at him, reaches for him, cups his face. “Come here,” he says, drawing Seonghwa down.

Seonghwa still likes to go out and hunt, once in a while. He always says that the tourists of Bourbon Street and those wandering the night graveyards are not only easy targets but their blood is sweet with adrenaline and the high his bites bring. So he's near full this evening, his body flush and warm, and when his tongue slips into Yunho's mouth, his kiss is heated. Even more when he shifts, eyes dark, to pull the blankets away and part Yunho's legs, to tug his body down the bed. He pulls Yunho up his own body so he can kiss at the soft skin of Yunho's thighs. Yunho shivers, gasps and grabs at the pillow as Seonghwa bites, deeply, into the femoral artery, takes several long, sucking pulls of blood before he licks the wound closed.

Just that touch, that control, those dark eyes, are enough to make Yunho weak for him, never mind the pleasure of his bite.

“Seonghwa,” he shivers, biting into his own bottom lip as he is manhandled, prepared, entered. Seonghwa bends over him and pushes his arms under Yunho's shoulders to fist in his hair. He pulls Yunho's head back. He thrusts and peppers Yunho's neck with bites, tiny little things, drops of blood and nothing more.

“_Seonghwa,_” Yunho whispers, hands clawing down Seonghwa's pale back, panting.

“Yes, my love,” he asks, and his voice is so soft on Yunho's neck. A tease in itself, before he kisses his way up to Yunho's mouth and kisses him—slices Yunho's tongue against his teeth and sucks, moves, thrusts and pulls Yunho's hair and Yunho's losing blood fast but that doesn't stop him from orgasming—if anything it makes the orgasm more intense, leaves him shaking, leaves him dying as Seonghwa licks his tongue and his own lips.

“I love when you die for me,” Seonghwa breathes, mouthing at Yunho's neck and biting, truly biting. Yunho is gone within thirty seconds, limp. Dead.

When he comes back Seonghwa is still inside him, still kissing at his neck, still holding his hair.

“You're insatiable,” Yunho accuses breathlessly, and Seonghwa smiles down at him.

“Surely you wouldn't have me any other way,” he says, pushing harder into Yunho's oversensitive body. Yunho gasps. “No,” he laughs out, sliding his hands up Seonghwa's arms, over his shoulders and into his hair, smiling against those lips, those teeth, that mouth. “No, never.”

They aren't done having sex by the time Mingi gets back, and Mingi whines and complains all the way down to the basement, where he goes to play video games and pout until Yunho and Seonghwa are done and have changed the bloody sheets.

But Seonghwa can go all night, and sometimes he does. Sometimes he takes and takes and takes until Yunho is shaking, has nothing more to give and yet still, somehow, Seonghwa coaxes more out of him. It's incredible. Terrifying.

Yunho loves him so, so much.

He'd learned to truly love Seonghwa not long after Seonghwa killed him the first time. It's a blessing, Yunho thinks, as Seonghwa pushes into him one last time with a long, low sigh. It's a blessing that he gets to keep loving Seonghwa, for as long as the two of them care for one another.

It is the most precious, precious part of his heart.

(Mingi does eventually come back upstairs. He mutters and pouts and fusses but gets into bed and closes his eyes, making himself small against Yunho's front while Seonghwa is pressed tight against Yunho's back.

Yunho kisses his head, and tells Mingi that he loves him, too.)

> _January 23rd, 2023._
> 
> _My name is Jeong Yunho. I've been alive since 1850._
> 
> _Lee Hongbin is sending another immortal here, one with vampire companions. I'm... Kind of excited to meet them._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> stay safe all!!


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sex in this one!  
enjoy~

> _It is January 5th, 2023._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, aged twenty years and twelve after._
> 
> _After considering Hongbin's proposal, we have decided to go to New Orleans. Putting legal papers together is harder than I thought._

They're planning to leave near the end of January. Yeosang is fairly sure he'll have it all done by then. He'd had to call Taekwoon for help, though it had been Hakyeon who knew more about it—getting papers for Jongho, San and Wooyoung. It was a task. It involved a great deal of money and magic changing hands.

But, after a lot of stress and confusion and worry, all of Yeosang's charges have IDs and birth certificates and social security cards, just like Yeosang does. San seems to find the whole thing endlessly amusing, though he doesn't like the effect it has on Yeosang. He rubs at Yeosang's scalp and neck, massaging out his tension when he comes home from meetings and exchanges and other legal nonsense that has to go through very specific lawyers because they are magical, like Yeosang is, and have perfected the art of making people seem to appear, yet also disappear.

Yeosang is so very, very tired.

He collapses into his bed, dropping face-first into it, and is a little glad that 'the boys' are out for the evening, so he can get a little extra sleep. Being dead doesn't count as sleep, and feeding three vampires can be hard on his body when they get too enthusiastic all at the same time. Maybe he should make a schedule for them.

But then Wooyoung's voice comes from the doorway. Rasping and sweet and almost like San's.

“Yeosang?”

“Mmm?” Yeosang asks, turning his head toward the door. Wooyoung is pursing his lips together, his arms wrapped around himself.

“Can I talk to you?”

“Of course,” Yeosang nods, sitting up, leaning into the headboard and smiling a little when Wooyoung climbs up into the bed. He still doesn't sleep under the covers, and he doesn't really touch Yeosang except to bite, so it's unusual that he moves closer, sitting with his legs crossed beside Yeosang's thigh. “What's up?”

“I just...” Wooyoung takes a deep breath and lets it out in a sigh. “I just. Wanted to say thank you, that's all. Properly. I know... This can't be easy for you. Since we're all hungry all the time. And I'm... I'm really glad you let me stay. Even though it's hard on you.” He smiles a little through his lavender hair and Yeosang smiles.

“You don't need to thank me for that, Wooyoung,” he says.

“But I want to,” Wooyoung protests, scooting even closer. “I don't—I don't think you understand, Yeosang, just what you've done for me. By allowing me to stay here, by—by taking care of me.” His eyes are a little red at the edges.

“It's been a really long time since someone cared enough to do that.”

Wooyoung hasn't talked to Yeosang about the circumstances that San had apparently pulled him from. He hadn't talked to any of them about it, really. Jongho still expresses curiosity from time to time, but he knows when to stop pushing, can tell when Wooyoung is uncomfortable. That's a skill Yeosang had to teach him, and it hadn't been easy.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Yeosang asked. It takes a minute before Wooyoung nods, pursing his lips together.

“I, um. I was born in the late forties,” Wooyoung started. “My parents were immigrants, we... We lived in California. San Francisco. They, um. They died, when I was nineteen. That was right in the middle of all the gay kids coming to the city, right, because... Because it was safe to be gay there, even if you were homeless or whatever. It was safer than anywhere else.”

Yeosang doesn't miss the way Wooyoung holds himself, rather than reaching out for comfort, the way San had after getting the spells removed, and before he'd come back to them. Now San seeks comfort from whichever one of them is available to him, but Wooyoung has never done that. Yeosang just listens, just lets Wooyoung speak.

“Then, in um. When I was twenty two, in 1969, there was this... This riot. On Halloween. One of the newspapers had printed the personal information of a bunch of gay men, their addresses and stuff and...” Wooyoung licks his lips. “And I was on that list. I didn't know what was going on, as it happened. I didn't find out till after. I got killed. I got, um.”

Wooyoung's breathing is hard, and Yeosang offers his hand. Wooyoung takes it, much to his relief. He's crying, though he hasn't touched his face. The blood just drips down.

“I got... Dragged out of my house, thrown in the back of a van by a bunch of straight guys, and they... Drove me up somewhere outside the city. They, um. They raped me, and... Beat me unconscious, and... Left me there. To die, or make my way back on my own, I didn't really know. I didn't think they expected me to live. Didn't think they wanted me to.”

Yeosang squeezes Wooyoung's hand. Wooyoung squeezes back.

“And my sire was. He told me he was just walking through the area, he lived out around there. He found me, decided I was worth turning. I stayed with him for a while, after. He took care of me, he... He wasn't a bad person. Or at least I didn't think so, at the time. I look back on it now, and he was really awful to me. In ways I couldn't understand. I wasn't smart like that. I'm still not, I'm... Too simple for manipulation and stuff like that. But he didn't try to hide it so much at the end.”

Wooyoung smiles around his tears and it's terrible. It's so, so terrible.

“We went to go visit one of his friends in the city. I hadn't been down there since my rebirth. My sire always brought humans to me. He encouraged me to kill them, and when I couldn't do it, he did. But we went to go visit one of his friends in the city. I was really nervous, but he promised it'd be fine.”

“And it wasn't,” Yeosang guesses, rubbing his thumb across Wooyoung's hand.

“It really, really wasn't.” Wooyoung shook his head. “He, um. He sold me to her. I don't know what she gave him in exchange, but he sold me to her. This... This man I'd spent two years with, learning to care for, maybe even... I don't know, I thought I was in love with him but that might have been all the gaslighting.”

Yeosang manages to swallow, instead of reach out and grab Wooyoung tightly and hold him to his chest. Wooyoung might be older than he was but no one—_no one—_deserves that horror.

“So I was... Sold into her 'service.' Turns out he'd been doing it for a while. Getting gay men kidnapped and turning them, so he could sell them to her. He'd arranged—after the paper had published addresses, he'd had me—he's the one who had me dragged out of my house, he told those men where to ruin me, he paid them to make sure they didn't kill me, but they were free to do as they wanted.”

“Oh, Wooyoung,” Yeosang breathes, beyond horrified. He tries to imagine Gunwoo betraying him so cruelly and can't. “Oh Wooyoung I'm so sorry.”

“And I was... I was trapped with that woman for a really long time. Sometimes she had human employees, when we were staying somewhere for a while, that's how I met San. I was there when she turned him, he... God he fought her every inch of the way.” Wooyoung smiles. “He gave her such a hard time. He was so brave. He wasn't scared of her and he wasn't afraid to show her that. When she... After she left him in that dumpster, I was...” Wooyoung shakes his head.

“I was inconsolable. I was _devastated, _my best friend—she'd killed my best friend, or I thought she had. But I'm not like San, I'm not. I'm not brave like he is. I couldn't fight her, I couldn't do anything against her, I was so scared. I didn't want to die.” Wooyoung's voice is tiny and full of self-loathing.

“That's understandable,” Yeosang says.

“So I... I just let her do what she wanted with me, because what was the point? What was the point of trying to stop her, when San was gone, when I was so... So fucking _broken._” Wooyoung finally wipes at his eyes, pushing the tears out towards his ears instead of rubbing his eyes with his fists as San does, or smearing them across his cheeks and under his eyes like Jongho.

“When San came, I... I couldn't believe it was him, that he'd found me, I couldn't—and he didn't even let me ask any questions he just. Pulled off my straps and dragged me through the window. He'd opened it with a fucking fork and a pocket knife.”

“Sounds like San,” Yeosang says, still rubbing his thumb over Wooyoung's hand.

“And we just. We just fucking _ran,_” Wooyoung says, his voice shaking. “We ran from Denver, that's where we were, I guess San had to _find _us and it took forever, since she's always moving us around, the place is magical as hell. We went southeast, through Kansas City and Oklahoma—that's how you get to Interstate 95, which is a straight shot all the way up to New York. We were hoping she'd give up by then. But that bitch fucking chased us all the way up to Baltimore. We hitched and hid and did everything to get away from her, we had to get off the highway in Savannah and go west through all these little shit towns and steal cars and remember to eat. We started feeding off each other because it was too dangerous to hunt, there were Hunters everywhere and she was still tailing us—and when she finally fucking left, we. I was so fucking relieved, I probably cried for hours. It's a fucking thirteen hour drive from Atlanta to New York, and it took us _a_ _fucking month._”

Wooyoung wipes at his face again. “And all San would say was that he was—he was taking us somewhere safe, with someone who would make sure we were okay, that we _would _be okay as long as we got to New York, but... But we'd been feeding off one another exclusively, since Baltimore, and we were both so fucking tired, but San wasn't willing to risk biting into someone and killing them, we didn't want to risk leaving any kind of trail, so. So it took forever for us to do that last leg. Everything hurt, we were so... So fucked up, and tired, and.” He heaves a sigh. Still breathing, even though he doesn't have to.

“And we got here, and your door was closed and it wouldn't open and San just kind of... Sat down and said you'd be back, promised you'd come back and you did. You... You came back, and San and I—Jesus we basically attacked you,” Wooyoung laughs. The sound is crippled. “Killed you a half dozen times at least. I couldn't believe it, you just. Kept coming back. I was so fucking relieved. I'd—I'd been living off blood bags and fucking semen and I sometimes got to bite, but not nearly as often as I needed to. I was fucking ravenous. San stopped me from killing anyone on the way here.” Wooyoung wipes at his eyes again, and Yeosang reaches out to touch him, feeling like he's allowed, now that he's heard this story.

“So I'm just. I'm just really, really grateful,” Wooyoung says. “That you're. That you're doing this for San, for. For _me. _You don't even—you didn't even know me and you. You're so fucking _kind _to me. _Thank you._”

Yeosang wants to say 'you're welcome.' He wants to say something about how it's not a big deal, but it's clearly a big deal for Wooyoung, so instead he just reaches out to hold him, to pull him in for a hug, to kiss his hair and rub his shoulders while Wooyoung sniffs.

“You know, I...” Yeosang takes a breath. “When I died the first time, it was because my lover left me. He was the man I'd lost my family for, he was my whole world. I'd given up everything else for him, because I thought he'd stay with me.”

“But he didn't,” Wooyoung says.

“But he didn't,” Yeosang nods. It's been a long time. It hurts less to talk about it now. “So I slit my wrists in the bathtub, because I wanted him to come back to the apartment we shared to get his things and I wanted him to find me there. I wanted him to see the result of his cruelty. I wanted revenge on my parents for kicking me out in the first place, for... For them telling me that I was an abomination, that I was disgusting, that I wasn't their son. I just wanted to stop existing, because it just seemed so exhausting and unfair and I was so tired.”

Yeosang cards his fingers through Wooyoung's hair. “And then I woke up again. I woke up again and my mentor, he... He taught me about what had happened to me, what was going to happen to me. He's in the Sleep, now.”

“What's that,” Wooyoung asks, his head resting on Yeosang's shoulder.

“It's what happens to immortals. People like me, when they don't find a motivation for living. It happens ever couple hundred years, or so I was told, but Gunwoo had gone... More than a thousand without the Sleep. So when his body finally gave up and dragged him into it, I was completely lost, I was so afraid. What was I supposed to do without him, he was my companion, he was my mentor and my friend. I came to New York because I didn't know what else to do. And then I met Jongho. He took _literal _bites out of me, because he'd been starving for that long.”

“Ouch,” Wooyoung says.

“Yeah,” Yeosang laughs. “It definitely hurt. But I woke again and he was so young. He was so young and afraid and I couldn't just leave him there, so I didn't. I brought him home, took him in. I found San, a little later. And now you're here.” He kisses the top of Wooyoung's head.

“And I found my motivation to stay alive, so I don't end up like Gunwoo, falling into the Sleep because I don't have a reason to stay awake. You, San and Jongho _are _my reasons to keep living. Taking care of you... Makes me happy. Makes me feel good. So in a way it's kind of selfish.”

“No it's not,” Wooyoung says, sitting up, staring at Yeosang with his bright, beautiful eyes. “It's not selfish, Yeosang. You're saving us. That's not selfish.”

Yeosang smiles, tucks back Wooyoung's messy hair. “If you say so.”

“I do,” Wooyoung says. Firmly. Yeosang nods, and then looks at Wooyoung, rubbing a hand up and down his arm.

“Are you hungry?” he asks, and Wooyoung nods. “Okay, let me just—”

“Wait,” Wooyoung says, flushing. “So you... You're like me, right?” Yeosang blinks.

“Gay,” Wooyoung says, very quietly.

“Yes,” Yeosang replies. “Why?”

“Can...” Wooyoung licks his lips. “Could we have sex before I...?” he asks, and he's a little flushed, not looking at Yeosang.

“It's just, it's been a really long time and I—I mean we don't have to—” Wooyoung stammers out. Yeosang thinks about how long it's been since those incidents with Jongho and San. How long it had been before that. Well before Gunwoo found him.

“Yeah,” Yeosang nods, smiling. “Yeah, Wooyoung, we can.”

So Yeosang lets Wooyoung pleasure him—slide his mouth down and his fingers in. Lets him drag his teeth down from tip to thigh, gasps when he bites in, having to push Yeosang's leg down against the bed to pierce the artery he's aiming for. Wooyoung swallows when Yeosang cums, breathes Yeosang's cry of pleasure when he pushes in, in in until their bodies are wound up in one another. Wooyoung pins Yeosang's wrists to the bed. Wooyoung fucks Yeosang breathless, bites into his neck and keeps up his rhythmic movement even as Yeosang cums again, gasping in shock, one hand fisting tightly in Wooyoung's hair. He hasn't had sex in so long his body is _shaking, _thighs trembling violently in overstimulation but it's so good it's so, so good.

“Keep going,” he whispers, “Keep going, Wooyoung don't stop don't—”

He doesn't. Wooyoung pants into Yeosang's neck, bites him again and again until he is on the very cusp of death, everything dark and cold and he feels Wooyoung tangle their fingers.

“It's okay, Yeosang,” Wooyoung breathes across his face, kissing him with his bloodied mouth, biting into Yeosang's tongue and lips and Yeosang feels himself dying. “I'll—”

The words are lost to death. But Yeosang comes back fast, gasping for air, choking on it when Wooyoung thrusts. He's not hard but Wooyoung is changing that, holding one of Yeosang's legs under the thigh, pulling up, changing the angle. His thrusts are snaps of his hips, hard and fast, and his other hand is still holding Yeosang's.

“Yeosang,” he breathes, bending down, “Oh god, _Yeosang._”

Wooyoung doesn't bite him. He slides their mouths together in a deep, tonguing kiss. Yeosang drapes his arms around Wooyoung's neck. Wooyoung slows his movements, lets Yeosang's thighs collapse over his own. His hands cup Yeosang's face tenderly, and they kiss for a very, very long time. Long enough for Wooyoung's blood-flushed body to go soft. Long enough that by the time San and Jongho get back, Wooyoung and Yeosang are on their sides, still kissing, lips wet and stinging. It's been so long since Yeosang kissed someone like this. Since someone _wanted _to kiss him like this.

“Gross,” Jongho says from the doorway. Wooyoung raises a middle finger and Yeosang laughs into his mouth.

“It's adorable,” San says, grabbing Jongho by the jacket, Yeosang can hear it. “Come on, lets go sleep in my room.”

“But—”

Jongho's protests are muffled by the door closing. It's Wooyoung's turn to laugh.

“He probably knew this was going to happen,” he speaks against Yeosang's lips, which are raw, swollen with their intimacy.

“Mm?”

“San,” Wooyoung says, running his fingers through Yeosang's hair. “He probably knew we were going to have sex.”

“Mmm.” Yeosang is too tired to care. His body feels limp and sore in the best possible way. God, it's been so, so long. And that felt _amazing._ “Gonna do it again, sometime.” He breathes out, exhausted.

“Any time you want,” Wooyoung promises, giving one last soft, wet kiss to the corner of Yeosang's mouth as Yeosang drifts off to sleep, real sleep.

He doesn't wake for almost twenty-four hours.

Wooyoung is still curled up beside him; face to face and still holding on. Jongho is pressed to Yeosang's back. San sleeps behind Wooyoung. Jongho and San are reaching over Yeosang and Wooyoung to hold one another's hands.

> _It is January 20th, 2023._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, aged twenty years and twelve after._
> 
> _The paperwork is all done. We leave tomorrow. Wooyoung and I were intimate last night. I haven't felt anything like that in a very long time._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yeah i'm on my woosang shit what of it >.>;;;


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> no big warnings for this one~  
enjoy!

> _It is January 24th, 2023._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, aged twenty years and twelve after._
> 
> _We've arrived in New Orleans. The boys are beside themselves. _

It isn't that Wooyoung doesn't want to let go of Yeosang's hand, it's just... Okay he doesn't want to let go of Yeosang's hand, whatever, shut up. San and Jongho have been making fun of him for it for _days._ For the entire ride down to New Orleans they've been teasing and prodding and being super fucking obnoxious every chance they get because they're both annoying and dumb and Wooyoung hates them.

...Okay he doesn't hate them but he's still really frustrated and he wishes they would stop. Yeosang is unaffected—but he's unaffected by a lot of things. He just holds Wooyoung's hand as they walk down the road to the store that belongs to a man named Jaehwan, one of Hongbin's contacts, apparently. Jongho and San are a few paces in front of him and Yeosang, oohing and ahhing over everything they see. They look stupid. Wooyoung won't say that, because he doesn't want to hurt their feelings, but they look stupid. Like little kids. It's disgusting and adorable.

“Are we almost there?” Wooyoung asks, glancing at Yeosang's phone.

“Mm,” Yeosang nods. “Yeah. A few more blocks, straight down, then two to the right. It'll be on the left.”

“Race you there!” Jongho says as he takes off running into the twilight-dark roads, followed very quickly by San shouting that Jongho is cheating. Both of disappear and Yeosang sighs with great fondness. Wooyoung brings their interlocked fingers up to his lips to kiss them. Yeosang looks at him warmly, tugs their hands to _his _mouth and gives them the kind of kiss Wooyoung expects in bed—wet, lots of tongue, a little bite. Wooyoung shivers and smiles. Yeosang smirks.

They've been... Really close, since they had sex. It's not like it was all that long ago, just four days, but since then, they've been more intimate. Yeosang hadn't stopped Wooyoung from grabbing him, holding him, biting his neck while pinning him against the counter in the kitchen and rocking their hips together. Or pinning Yeosang against a wall, holding his legs apart under the thighs and just thrusting against his groin until he cums with one of those gorgeous little moans. It doesn't feel like Yeosang is just humoring him, either. It feels... Well, it feels like they've shared a really intimate experience (which they have) and it's brought them closer together (which is has) and Yeosang seems to enjoy the extra closeness (and goodness knows Wooyoung does.) The extra touches, kisses, long, tight hugs and showering together. Yeosang had shyly explained that it had been almost thirteen years since the last time anything like this has happened to him, aside from stolen moments with San when he bit. That Yeosang had enjoyed it, and wouldn't mind doing it again.

That doesn't mean that they're dating or anything, but Wooyoung doesn't think they're just... What's the word. Fuckbuddies. He doesn't think they're just fuckbuddies, either. It's too intimate for that, they're too close for that. But 'lovers' seems _too _intimate.

Wooyoung is a little confused but he likes what's happening to him, so he lets himself enjoy it for whatever it is.

They finally catch up with San and Jongho, who are practically bouncing outside the storefront that reads simply, _Blackest Night. _A little dramatic, Wooyoung thinks, but then again they _are _in New Orleans and Jaehwan _is _a witch.

He'd been wondering, before they came, if it was really going to be safe down here—they're too close to Atlanta for his liking—but Yeosang had assured him that nothing would happen to him, he wouldn't let it. And besides that, New Orleans was free of Hunters. They aren't allowed in the city, on order of the Council of Witches that rules over it. Everything else is free to come and go, but not Hunters, and the magical citizens of the city are known to have a no-tolerance policy to the kind of violence Wooyoung and San had experienced—which is probably why the Madam had never brought her business to New Orleans.

So Wooyoung tries not to feel anxious as Yeosang pushes open the door to the store. It smells like incense and flowers and beneath that, there is the unmistakable tinge of _vampire. _He blinks as Yeosang goes inside, unafraid, tugging Wooyoung behind him. Jongho snickers, says something about Wooyoung being whipped. Wooyoung reaches back with his free hand to slap him across the head but he can't reach.

“Stay with me,” Yeosang says, looking back at Jongho and San. His voice is a bit hard. “Don't touch anything. I mean it.”

So the three of them follow Yeosang up to the counter. His walk is a little stiff, a little fast. Once they reach the counter Yeosang stares at, and then lifts, a silver bell. He holds it around the entire bell, so that the little hanging thing inside of it just makes a dull click when it shifts. Yeosang frowns, expression darkening. He doesn't put the bell down, but he doesn't shake it, either.

“Excuse me,” he calls, through the door behind the counter. “I'm looking for Jaehwan Lee.”

A man appears as if by magic, startling Wooyoung so badly he steps back against San. Yeosang, though, does not startle. He just stares at the man, looking extremely cross. His mouth is tight, his eyes narrow.

“Aah,” the man says. He's beautiful, really. A beautiful nose, beautiful lips and vibrant orange eyes. Soft dark hair pushed back off his face, though his expression is flat, save for his mouth twisted into an almost wickedly delighted smirk. “You must be Kang Yeosang.”

“And you must be an asshole,” Yeosang says, still holding the bell. “To leave something like this on the counter when you knew I was bringing three young vampires with me.” Wooyoung wants to protest being called _young, _but he knows better. Yeosang's voice is cold. Icy, even.

“Do you think I'm foolish enough to let them wander about on their own in a place where they could be killed so easily?”

“You let them run here, did you not?”

“They're perfectly capable of defending themselves out there,” Yeosang says. Wooyoung hasn't seen him so... Agitated, before. He almost wants to step away, but San is right behind him, hand pressed to his back, no doubt holding Jongho's hand with his other.

“Don't worry,” San whispers. “He knows what he's doing.”

“But in here?” Yeosang continues. “Who knows what tricks or traps you've set out to harm them if they displease you. So I ask again. Do you think I'm foolish enough to let them wander about on their own in a place where they could be killed so easily?”

The man—who must be Jaehwan—grins with a smile so bright it's like a sunbeam. “You're just as clever as my contact said you were,” he says, lifting his fingers to snap. Wooyoung feels the air shift, moving to fill empty spaces. There had been traps, he realizes. Lots of them, if he'd been able to hear that sound.

“I'm glad.”

“That was unnecessary,” Yeosang says. The bell that had been in his hand has disappeared.

“Of course it wasn't,” Jaehwan replies, almost flippant. “I test all magical beings who come through my doors, young man, and that includes Immortals and their... Children.”

“We're not _kids,_” Jongho says, glaring, and San tugs on his hand to silence him.

“Regardless.” Jaehwan waves his hand again. “You've found your way here, and now you will find your way to Yunho. Though I don't think you really need directions, do you, Kang Yeosang. No, you do not. Not here, where it all flows so freely. New York in... His fist, but here? Here we are free to do as we please. And so, you will be able to find him with no problem. He was here earlier, with his children. I'm sure you'll get there before nightfall proper.”

“Very well.” Yeosang turns, motions the three of them towards the door. They've opened it, San is stepping through, when Jaehwan calls,

“And, Kang Yeosang?”

Yeosang turns to look at him, stone-faced.

“Enjoy your stay in the Big Easy.”

Yeosang says nothing. He steps through the doorframe and closes it gently behind him, taking a deep breath. Wooyoung can hear his heartbeat. It's thundering. He hadn't been able to hear it inside the shop, Wooyoung realizes, with a startled look back at the door.

“His entire shop is nullified,” Yeosang says, taking deep, slow breaths. “Your charms meant nothing in there. Anything on those shelves could have killed you.” He reaches out to grab San and Jongho's laced hands, squeezes down on all three of them as though to assure himself that they are still all right. “That bell could have—” he cuts off, pushing his hand against his heart.

“Lets just. Lets just go.” He steps out from beneath the front awning and, after a moment of hesitation and looking around, leads them to the left. “Come on.”

They walk in silence for a few minutes. Then, Jongho finally asks,

“What did he mean? That you didn't need directions?”

“I can,” Yeosang licks his lips and Wooyoung squeezes his hand. “I can see magical threads, I guess you would call them. It's how I found San, it's how I knew San was home. And now,” Yeosang huffs out a breath.

“Now, I'm following these two lines of magic, because they came out of the store. It's just as likely a path as any, but there's more of a... A tug on it. Because it's leading me to what I want to find, which is the other immortal and his two charges.”

“Cool,” Jongho says, and asks nothing more about it. Which is good because otherwise Wooyoung would ask a _million _questions, all about how that happened, when he learned it, what does it feel like, what do their threads look like? Are they all tangled up together, or are they not? Are they all the same color?

But he doesn't ask any of his questions. Just follows Yeosang's lead back to their rented car. Holds his hand as they drive all the way to a large, plantation style (though certainly newer) house outside the suburbs. Way out. Miles out. The sun has completely set, though there are still some clinging beams stretching over the clouds, creating rakes of pink and gold in the sky.

The place they've pulled up to doesn't _look_ like anything special, but as they get out of the car in the driveway Wooyoung starts to feel the anxious jitters that accompany the presence of a vampire he doesn't know. Maybe it's like Yeosang. Wooyoung just... knows when there are strange vampires around, though it looks like Jongho and San are feeling it, too.

Then there is someone there in front of them, a vampire, and Wooyoung jerks Yeosang behind him fast, so fast. He's never moved that fast. He feels that Jongho and San have moved, too—he barely hears Yeosang gasp. They have him surrounded. There must be another vampire at their backs. That's why San and Jongho are there, their shoulders nearly against his. There's only two, if there are only two they can take them, if there are more then—

“That's _enough,_” comes a voice from the large, screened in porch of the house. “Good lord. Get back over here, you absolute shitheads. If this is what you're going to do every time I tell you I'm expecting company I'm going to lock you up somewhere.”

The voice has a slight southern accent, and Wooyoung doesn't let his guard down for a _second, _he doesn't know this man, he doesn't know these vampires, like _fuck _he's letting anyone get _near _Yeosang after what Jaehwan had done at the store—trapped them on purpose, made sure they couldn't defend themselves if one of them touched something even by accident—

Then the vampires are gone, and Wooyoung still hasn't let go of Yeosang. None of them have. Jongho is holding his other hand and San has a deathgrip on his shirt. Wooyoung can feel the pull and stretch of the fabric.

“I'm sorry about that,” comes the voice again, as a man moves off the steps. “Seonghwa's protective. And Mingi is a baby.”

“I am not!” comes a protesting voice. Wooyoung does not _care. _

“Back the fuck up,” he says, squeezing Yeosang's hands so hard he must be cracking his bones.

“I ain't gonna hurt you,” the man says, continuing to walk closer.

“I will rip your fucking throat out,” San snarls from over Wooyoung's shoulder.

“Now that ain't necessary,” the man puts a hand on his hip, even as one of the vampires appears in front of San and grabs him by the throat. Wooyoung sees over his shoulder, the sudden rush of blood pouring out of San's mouth and reaches, but Jongho is faster and has his teeth in the stranger's forearm, is biting down hard enough to tear off a piece of flesh. Wooyoung hears it rip off. Hears hit the ground with a nasty little _plop. _

“Don't you _dare _touch my family,” Jongho says, unnecessary breath wet through his teeth.

“Jongho,” Yeosang finally says, reaching out, Wooyoung can feel it. He must be pulling Jongho in against the safety of his body while San coughs, sounding like his trachea has been crushed. “Jongho shh, shh. It's fine, it's fine, I'm okay. Baby I'm okay. San? Honey?” San doesn't turn away from the threat that must still be in front of him, but Yeosang's shoulder moves. Probably to let San bite into his wrist. Then he finally turns completely, pressing his free hand to Wooyoung's stomach.

“Wooyoung. Sweetheart, it's okay.”

“It's _not,_” Wooyoung hisses. “They _threatened _you.”

“Like he can actually die,” says Mingi, the one on the porch. “You're no fun at _all._”

“Shut the fu—”

“Everyone _stop._” Yeosang is not loud, but his voice is sharp. It carries through the yard to everyone's ears. “Stop. I know you're keyed up, I know you're upset about what Jaehwan did,” he says to them. “That's not a reason to behave this way. Stop. Please.”

It still sounds like a request, even now. Wooyoung slowly lets his shoulders down, forces himself to relax. Feels San do the same. Jongho takes a minute, his breath is still heaving, Wooyoung can hear it. His mouth is probably covered in blood.

“Jongho,” Yeosang says, letting go of Wooyoung's hand, presumably to comfort Jongho. “Come here.” Wooyoung knows that Yeosang is wrapping Jongho up in a hug, reassuring him. Jongho always needs reassurance. Wooyoung can't blame him. He's a very young vampire. He was turned violently, left alone for who knows how long. He needs someone to remind him that they're always here for him.

“Now,” Yeosang says. “If we could all be civil for a moment, please.” He steps around Wooyoung, and Wooyoung goes to jerk forward, but Yeosang's fingers brush his chest in a silent request to hold still, so he does. Barely. One wrong move and Wooyoung is going to make good on his thread to rip a throat out.

“I'm Kang Yeosang,” Yeosang says, offering his hand out to the man with the southern accent.

“Yunho Jeong,” the man replies, smiling. Wooyoung hates it. “I'm sorry. They're usually much better behaved.”

“Mmm,” Yeosang says. “There was an... Incident, with Jaehwan earlier. They've been agitated since we left his shop.”

“Incident,” Yunho says, cocking his head.

“Mm. He—”

“He trapped the entire place hoping we'd make some kind of fucking mistake,” San said, standing with his arms crossed beside Wooyoung. “Yeosang saw right through him. He was an asshole.”

“San.”

“He was!”

“I know,” Yeosang says, sighing. “But it's over, honey. It's over. Let it go, all right?”

“Aah,” Yunho nods. “Yeah he. He does that. I can't tell if it's to protect himself or just to test people. He still does it to Mingi and Seonghwa sometimes. Just to make sure they're paying attention.”

“That's shitty,” Jongho mutters.

“Yeah it is,” Yunho agrees. “But regardless, there's nothing like that here. I'm Yunho. Mingi's on the porch. Seonghwa's probably right behind me trying to look threatening.”

He is.

“That one took a chunk out of me,” Seonghwa mutters, darkly.

“You kind of deserved it,” Yunho says. “That was rude.”

“I'm Wooyoung.” Wooyoung says, deciding that there's been enough of this nonsense, just wanting to get somewhere inside, because the mosquitos are coming out and Yeosang doesn't need a slow death from Malaria or something.

“This is San, and that's Jongho.”

“Well, why don't you three come inside. I got the east side all ready for you.”

Yeosang slips his fingers through Wooyoung's, and Wooyoung follows him. San and Jongho are close behind. They have to walk past Mingi, still standing on the porch. He and Jongho snap teeth at one another. A look over Yeosang's shoulder stops that immediately.

“Look, I'm sure you're tired,” Yunho says. “And I ain't up for any big talks tonight. I left some food in the fridge in the side kitchen, help yourself to whatever, and I'll see you all in the morning.”

“Thank you,” Yeosang says, giving Yunho a smile before he turns and basically herds all of them down a hall, closing the door behind him, and leads them into a bedroom.

San and Jongho are on Yeosang immediately, ripping off clothes, pushing him to the bed, climbing all over him like anxious puppies. Jongho sits at the head of the bed and pulls Yeosang against his chest, lets Yeosang's head fall back against his shoulder as he bites, as San bites at the same time, sitting on Yeosang's lap. It should probably make Wooyoung jealous, but instead it just warms him all the way through. Even as San rocks himself on top of Yeosang, even as Jongho whispers filth into his ear—a skill he's picked up from San, apparently, because while he usually isn't interested in sex himself, he doesn't mind participating like this—even as Yeosang orgasms, dying with his neck between their teeth. He comes back cradled between the two of them, wrapped in their clinging limbs and laughs, ruffling their hair.

“Brats,” he says, kissing each of them softly on the mouth. “I'm _fine._”

“Don't care,” Jongho says, and Yeosang hums.

“Mmm. My heroes. Let me up, I'm hungry.”

They let Yeosang up after a bit of protesting, and he walks past Wooyoung on his way to the kitchen. Wooyoung follows him, ignores San's yell of, _don't get any fluids on the counters, you're fucking gross! _

Yeosang is still nude as he moves around the kitchen, getting ready to make some simple fried rice with chicken with the supplies Yunho's left, so he says. Wooyoung just watches him, smiles at how he bustles about, humming to himself as he makes his food and eats it, shaking his hair out of his eyes, looking so fucking beautiful Wooyoung can't even stand it.

Almost as soon as Yeosang is done eating and has finished a glass of cranberry juice, Wooyoung slides in behind him, hands on Yeosang's chest, dragging down to his thighs.

“You're insatiable,” Yeosang says, though he doesn't actually sound upset about it. He just smiles, reaches over his shoulder to tug on Wooyoung's hair. Wooyoung hums, pressing up close, hard. He's been feeding a little more over the past few days—likes to keep himself full so he can do this, touch Yeosang like this, bring him pleasure.

He reaches for the bottle of olive oil on the counter.

“Seriously,” Yeosang laughs, breathless, and Wooyoung bites his shoulder.

“It was good enough for the Greeks,” he says, and Yeosang laughs again, bright and beautiful, and he doesn't complain about the slickened body pressed to his own. But for a while Wooyoung just thrusts himself between Yeosang's thighs, feels the smooth skin. Listens to Yeosang moan sweetly then ask, _more, Wooyoung please?_

When Wooyoung pushes into Yeosang it feels like dying all over again. He's so hot inside. So warm, so pliant. He wants Wooyoung just as badly as Wooyoung wants him and that—that drives Wooyoung a little crazy. Makes him thrust slow and deep, holding Yeosang open with both palms.

“Touch yourself,” Wooyoung breathes into Yeosang's ear, even though he doesn't need to breathe. “Both hands.”

“But—”

“Both hands,” Wooyoung insists, grunting when Yeosang's touch makes his body tighten, makes him gasp, his chest and cheek on the counter. Wooyoung fucks him slow and deep for as long as he can manage—but then Yeosang is whimpering into the counter, getting up on his toes to cum and Wooyoung thrusts hard, fast and shallow, pulling out every time, watching Yeosang cover his mouth with his own cum-covered hand, watches him slide his fingers between his lips and that's enough, that's enough to push Wooyoung over, drive in, grab Yeosang by the hair, yank him back and bite.

Yeosang just moans, sweetly, and moves on him. Re-penetrates himself with Wooyoung's tip over and over until he's quivering, shaking with overstimulation. As Wooyoung takes more blood, Yeosang becomes too exhausted to move, and sinks all the way down.

Wooyoung doesn't _cum_, not really. Vampires don't have semen, but they've got some kind of... Clear fluid, slick and warm and it's close enough, in his opinion. Wooyoung's groin pulses in something like an orgasm, and he holds Yeosang against him, shivering.

“You make me feel so good,” Wooyoung says, speaking between Yeosang's shoulders. “Haven't—haven't felt good in so long—not like this—”

“Yeah,” Yeosang breathes, tipping his head back, his neck curved against Wooyoung's head. “Yeah, sweetheart, I know. Me too.”

Wooyoung knows that the affection he and Yeosang share is different than the affection Yeosang shares with San and Jongho—and even the way he cares about the two of them is different from one another. Wooyoung has never met a person with so much warmth in their heart. So much _love. _

He doesn't say it, doesn't want to, not yet. Someday, maybe. When he's ready.

For now, Wooyoung moves away from Yeosang only far enough to grab a clean dishcloth to wipe him down. Yeosang smiles at him through his sweaty, messy hair. Wooyoung's starting to think he might do anything to keep that smile on Yeosang's face, which is terrifying.

But he also thinks that Yeosang wants to keep smiling at him like that. Which makes it easier.

“You're gross,” Jongho complains as Wooyoung brings Yeosang back to the bedroom, asleep in his arms.

“Quit whining,” Wooyoung murmurs, tucking Yeosang into bed. “Just because you're not interested doesn't mean I'm not.” Jongho snorts and takes his place at Yeosang's left side, San on his right. Wooyoung tucks himself up behind San.

“Give me a goodnight kiss,” San demands, and Wooyoung laughs, getting up on his elbow and turning San's head to press a peck to his lips. San glares up at him, and Wooyoung smiles, bending down to kiss San deeply, warmly. They cut into one another's tongues to share Yeosang's blood between them.

“_Stop it!_” Jongho hisses. “You're so gross! Let me sleep!”

“You're such a baby,” San teases, even as Wooyoung pulls away to lick San's lips clean, humming.

“Tomorrow,” Wooyoung promises. “More tomorrow.”

San nods, snuggling back down with a huff and closing his eyes. Wooyoung thinks it's funny that none of them really have to sleep, but they've all adjusted to Yeosang's rhythm. It's a good feeling, a warm feeling. The best feeling.

> _It is January 25th, 2023._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, aged twenty years and twelve after._
> 
> _We had an exhausting day though also, a pleasantly exhausting night._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well that was a great first impression wasn't it?


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> no big warnings. enjoy!

> _January 25rd, 2023._
> 
> _My name is Jeong Yunho. I've been alive since 1850._
> 
> _Yesterday didn't go so well. Because Seonghwa and Mingi can't be civilized._

Defensive, is the word Yunho would choose to describe their guests. Defensive and afraid that something was going to happen to their caretaker, no doubt. And he _is _their caretaker, that much is glaringly obvious. Yeosang clearly holds power over the three vampires and even more incredible, he doesn't have to use it. Yesterday, he'd been so startled by what was happening that he didn't have a chance to do anything. But when he _did _have a chance, his words had been simple requests, a simple 'please.' Those vampires had done as he asked, with only minor grumbling.

“That little one bit me,” Seonghwa pouts for the ten thousandth time.

“You attacked his brother.”

“That's not a reason to take a pound of flesh!”

“Obviously for him, it is.” Yunho replies, amused despite himself. “Judge not, lest ye be judged.”

“I wouldn't rip a piece out of someone just because they choked Mingi a little.”

“Hey!”

Yunho waves his hand in barely containable annoyance. Why the two of them have to argue like children at this exact moment, when he's already so stressed and agitated Yunho has no idea, but he wishes they would knock it off. After a moment of blessed silence, Mingi says,

“I kind of get it, though. I mean if they were already freaked out by Jaehwan being himself—”

“Behave,” Yunho says.

“—and they really thought they were at risk, it wasn't cool for us to do that. They probably thought we were _really _gonna attack them. And then Seonghwa had to be a _dick _about it.”

“The little one called them his family,” Seonghwa says, ignoring Mingi. “Do you think he rescued all of them?”

“Maybe,” Yunho says, pursing his lips. “Regardless, leave them alone. If you don't have something kind to say, just don't say anything. Try not to ask invasive questions.” Mingi nods, and Seonghwa rolls his eyes but does the same.

The next morning, when Yunho is sitting at the long center table of the dining room drinking juice and snacking on bread and cheese, Yeosang makes his way into the dining room and his littlest charge—the one that bit Seonghwa, Jongho?—comes out with him. The second and third, San and Wooyoung, both follow after, holding hands. They all look sleep-rumpled and soft. Yunho can see no trace of that vampires from yesterday. All he sees is four people who clearly love one another, watch out for one another. Any one of them would probably die for any other. It's... Sweet. Very sweet, Yunho thinks, as he watches Yeosang struggle through getting a cup of coffee with Jongho clinging to his back like a child at its mother's skirts.

It would be nauseating but for the sleepy look on Jongho's face, matching Yeosang's tender smile. The way Yeosang holds Jongho's hands against his belly. He lifts the mug up and Jongho smells it for a few moments, while Yeosang waits for it to cool enough to drink. Mingi still does that, sometimes. Hovers around while Yunho makes coffee, breathes in the smell and pouts that he misses drinking coffee in the morning.

Jongho sighs, and pushes his face back into Yeosang's shoulder. San and Wooyoung are sitting at the table, leaning into one another like they're going to fall back asleep, but San offers out his hand as Yeosang sits down and Yeosang holds it, his eyes still closed. He'd apparently had been depending on Jongho to help him get his coffee. Straight black, Yunho notices.

“Good morning,” Yunho says, keeping his voice low. Soft and unthreatening, he doesn't want to spook any of them. Mingi and Seonghwa are still in bed and likely to remain so—they're both heavy sleepers.

“Mmm,” Yeosang hims, sipping his coffee. “Morning.”

“Did you sleep well?”

“Yes,” Yeosang says, his eyes still closed. “Thank you.”

“Do your children always wake with you?” Yunho's curiosity is _burning _and without the threat of his own companions here, he wants to ask Yeosang _everything. _Everything, he wants to know all about him, all about his companions, he wants to—wants to be friends, because it's been so long since he felt safe enough to make friends. There aren't any immortals anywhere near him, and the last time he'd gone to Seattle, to meet one, the immortal he'd encountered been confused and more than a little disgusted by Seonghwa.

Yunho hadn't had any idea that some immortals—maybe all the others?—didn't have vampire companions. He hadn't feel bad about it. Hadn't feel odd or uncomfortable or ashamed of Seonghwa while he'd been there, and he hasn't ever felt that way. He's never felt like being with Seonghwa was wrong, or a bad decision. Clearly Yeosang is like him, and Yunho has been _dying _to speak to someone like himself for a very long time. That's probably why Hongbin sent them down here. Because he'd known.

Jongho levels Yunho with a sleepy glare. It's nowhere near as angry as yesterday's. Yeosang opens his eyes, takes another long sip of coffee.

“Generally, yes,” Yeosang replies. “But we also live in the city that never sleeps, so it doesn't really matter when we sleep. And San likes to nap a lot, so.” He laughs. “I sleep a lot, too.”

“How long have you lived in New York?”

“Since 2017, so... Six years? Yeah, it'll be six years in April.”

“Where did you live before?”

“Korea. A little north of Seoul, I... Stayed there with my mentor, when I couldn't stay in the city.”

“Aah,” Yunho nods, understanding. “You didn't age.”

“Partially,” Yeosang says. “And I was... Very overwhelmed. I'm glad I had him. I might have gone mad, otherwise.”

“Seonghwa is the one who killed me,” Yunho says. “So luckily I had him from the start. Not that it wasn't strange, but it was better than being by myself. Mingi came about seventeen years ago? Someone else had turned him and left him.” Yeosang's brows draw together and his lips turn down.

“That's despicable,” he says, his voice hard, and Jongho, who has been sitting at his side facing backwards, presses a little harder against him. Yeosang shifts from holding his coffee to wrapping his arm around Jongho, kissing the top of his head. “That's disgusting and cruel.”

“Yes,” Yunho agrees. “He... He was in a bad way when I found him. That sort of shit doesn't happen much here, luckily, but we don't have any Hunters to cull people who do that sort of thing. We all just sort of... Look out for each other. When something's off, or something goes wrong—we've got a support system in place for that.”

“You're very fortunate,” Yeosang says, reaching to lift his mug again.

“Like that dick from yesterday?” San asks, sitting up.

“San.” Yeosang says. “Don't.”

“He _was _a dick,” San mumbles. “He tried to trick you. Even Hongbin doesn't do that, and he's a dick sometimes. Though I like Hongbin a lot better than. What's-his-name, from yesterday.”

“Aah,” Yunho nods. “Jaehwan Lee. He's... A character. Extremely protective.”

“He had tricks and traps everywhere,” Wooyoung says, without sitting up. “N'he tried to get Yeosang to ring a silver bell.”

“I'm not surprised,” Yunho admits. “He's always defensive around new people, since we don't have any way to promise that newcomers aren't here to cause trouble. I'm sorry about that. If I'd known you were going to his place first, I'd have made sure we were there when you arrived.”

“It's all right,” Yeosang says. “It's over now, no one got hurt. So it's all right,” this last statement is directed at San. “I told you, honey. It's all right.”

Yunho blinks at the familiar, intimate nickname. Is Yeosang intimate with his companions? If so, Yunho would have though Wooyoung was he slept with. Maybe he sleeps with both of them? All of them?

“Yeah,” San mutters. “I know.”

“You're too tired to be up right now,” Yeosang chides gently. “You should all go back to bed. I need to talk to Yunho, anyway.”

“But—” Jongho protests.

“If something happens I will let you know.”

“Promise?” San asks.

“Promise. Go back to bed. All of you.”

Yunho watches in fascination, and something like awe, as Yeosang lets Jongho get up. Jongho gives him a peck on the cheek. San gives him a wet kiss on the mouth, and Wooyoung gives him a _kiss, _soft and wet as he slides his tongue between Yeosang's lips before pulling away. Yunho can see them connected by a string of saliva from where he sits.

Wooyoung also glares at Yunho, pointing to his own eyes with his pinkie and ring finger before turning his hand toward Yunho. Yeosang gives his arm a little slap, but he's smiling as Wooyoung walks away, presumably to join his other two companions in bed. Yeosang holds his mug in both hands. He looks infinitely more awake.

“Now,” Yeosang says. “I'm sure you have just as many questions as I do, so let me refill this and we can go sit somewhere more comfortable.” Yunho wants to ask if Yeosang is going to feel safe, being further away from the bedroom. But as though Yeosang can read his mind, he says,

“If anything happens, they're all fast enough to get anywhere within a mile of me in seconds. Brats.” But he's smiling, and he refills his mug, and Yunho leads him out into the living room, where all the squishy, comfortable chairs are. Yunho tucks himself in, watches Yeosang do the same.

“So...” Yunho starts. “When did you die?”

“2010,” Yeosang says. “I was born in 1990.”

“1850,” Yunho returns. “I was born in 1829.”

“So we're around the same physical age, that's cool.” Yeosang smiles, taking a sip of his coffee. “My mentor was around our age when he died, too. Twenty seven. He was born in 920.” Yunho stares.

“920, that. That would make him...” Yunho did some quick math. “A thousand and twenty tree, that's...”

“Mm,” Yeosang nods. “He... Went into the Sleep, in 2017. He'd never done it before. Taekwoon said he was so overdue for the Sleep that his body just... Overrode his mind. Forced him into it.”

“The Slee—oh, oh yes, Jaehwan explained it to me.” Yeosang cocks an eyebrow at Yunho, and he sighs.

“I promise he's not that big an asshole all the time. And that was super rude and unnecessary of him.”

“Indeed,” Yosang says, looking cross.

“But he explained that to me,” Yunho continues. “It's what happens when you don't have a life's reason, right? A motivation or conscious cause to keep you alive.”

“Mm.”

“So... Why did your mentor fall into it?” Yunho tries to be as delicate as possible. It's clearly a sore subject for Yeosang. “If he had you?”

“He was just... Too old,” Yeosang says, tucking a little further into himself. “He woke up alone in a battlefield in the spring, surrounded by dead men. He found me, when I died the first time. I'm lucky he was there, otherwise I might have just. Gone insane. But when he found me, he'd been smoking a lot of opium, did a lot of other drugs to try and cope. Sometimes... He sometimes had these fits of absolute madness, he couldn't control himself. He'd lock himself up when he felt them coming and dealt with them alone. Taekwoon said that was his body, trying to put him into the Sleep, and he forcibly kept himself from it.

“He wasn't like me,” Yeosang says. “He was alone for a long time, he didn't have anyone to help him, or tell him what was happening to him. It took him almost fifty years to find another immortal, and even that was... Sort of by accident.”

“I can't imagine,” Yunho says, and he really can't. He can't imagine waking up alone, in the middle of a gory, bloody battlefield, surrounded by dead bodies in the warm spring air. Wandering for years before finding another soul like himself. At least Yunho had Seonghwa.

“After that he started keeping records. Of where he was, who he'd met, how old he was... Because as he got older he'd forget things. He even chose his name for himself, because he can't remember what his name was, when he died.”

“And he found you?” Yunho asks.

“Yeah,” Yeosang says. “He was in Korea at the time. He has a lot of houses, kind of spread out all over the world. He rotates through them, so no one can start suspecting him.”

“That's smart,” Yunho says.

“He's very smart,” Yeosang hums a little over the rim of his mug. The sound faded, though. “But, the problem with him being so old when he went into the Sleep is that he could be asleep for decades. He's working on a deficit, after all. I...” Yeosang purses his lips together. “I miss him a lot.”

“I bet you do,” Yunho says, trying to imagine losing Seonghwa or Mingi for that long. He'd go insane. “So... When did you find your companions?”

Yeosang smiles. It's a small, sweet expression. “A few years ago. I ah... Found Jongho first. Or. He found me. He'd been abandoned by his maker. He's from somewhere near Chicago,” Yeosang says. “And he... Basically fled all the way to New York on foot with no idea what to do, or what was really going on. I was the first person he could grab and overpower, so he. Well, he killed me, and when I woke up he was still there, and I just. I couldn't _leave _him there. He was so pathetic, crying, terrified. So I brought him home, and... He never left.” Yeosang smiles again. It looks like he's holding a secret.

“He's the youngest, physically and... Vampirically? So he's my baby.”

“Aah, I see,” Yunho takes in this information. “Did you... Rescue all of them?”

“Yes,” Yeosang says. “Well. San brought Wooyoung back to me, but I rescued him too, in a way. I love them all very much.” Even if the display yesterday and this morning hadn't shown him that, those words just drive in that fact. Yunho can _see _how much they love one another.

“Not as children,” Yunho says. “As companions.”

“...Yes,” Yeosang says, flushing a little. “Like that.”

“Oh, don't be embarrassed,” Yunho says, laughing. “Seonghwa and I are like that. Mingi, too.”

“What are you doing, speaking of me when I am not present?” Seonghwa asks from where he stands in the doorframe of the west hallway.

“I was just telling Yeosang that we're intimate,” Yunho says, and Seonghwa flushes.

“That is not information that needs sharing.”

“Will you stop worrying about propriety and let me speak to my guest. Go back to bed.”

“I have no desire to do as such,” Seonghwa says, instead moving to stand behind Yunho, pulling him back protectively. Yunho rolls his eyes.

“I'm going to talk about us having sex whether or not you're here, Seonghwa.”

“You've no shame,” Seonghwa says. Yeosang laughs into his hand, hiding his smile. Seonghwa cocks an eyebrow at him, and Yunho pinches him for being rude. “And what, pray, do you find so amusing about this.”

“You're just a lot like my boys,” Yeosang says, finishing his coffee and setting the mug on the coffee table. “That's all.”

“I find that comparison distasteful.”

“You _did _crush San's throat and teeth yesterday. With all due respect, you haven't done anything to make you worth endearment. Not from me, and not from them.” Yeosang speaks clearly and calmly, still with a smile kissing the corner of his mouth. “Perhaps it will come with time. But as it is, Yunho and I are speaking, and I'd appreciate if you would let us do so in peace. And privately.”

Yunho can practically _feel _Seonghwa glaring. Yeosang had worded that _perfectly, _with just the right amount of politeness and force that Seonghwa has little choice but to follow his own propriety and manners and leave. So he does, with a kiss to Yunho's hand.

Yunho smirks, once he's gone.

“That was _masterful,_” he says. “You speak like that often?”

“Not generally,” Yeosang says. “It's just how my mentor spoke. I find that my companions respond better to a straightforward approach.” He leans back in his chair. “Now. Where were we?”

“Intimacy,” Yunho replies. “But we can leave that, for now. Save that I don't think what we do is grotesque or unacceptable in any way, but it's apparently not considered normal or acceptable among our kind. I've only met one other, and they were... Less than accepting of Seonghwa and I. They were especially reviled by our relationship, despite that it benefits both Seonghwa and myself.”

“Because you have a companion, and no one gets killed, yes. That was my reasoning. They're...” Yeosang smiles, a real smile, soft and happy. “They're my reason for living.”

Yunho smiles back at him. “I'm glad that you have them. And I'm sure they'll all get along eventually. Mingi, especially. Seonghwa doesn't entertain his need to play very often, so I'm sure meeting others closer to his own age will benefit him.”

“Probably,” Yeosang says, looking thoughtful. “I think they need each other too. Vampires, I mean. When they're alone, they seem really unstable, and volatile. I'm not sure it's the same thing as us,” he makes a back and forth motion between him and Yunho. “But maybe we're meant to find one another. Maybe that's how it's supposed to work.”

“I like that,” Yunho smiles. “That we're all fated to be this way. Together, like this.” He pauses. “How long do you plan on staying down here?” Yeosang shrugs.

“I didn't really have a plan. It's just. Hongbin told me I should be here, and he. Hongbin _knows._ So I wanted to do as he suggested, after some thinking on it. I'd been in New York for a while anyway, so it was probably good to get out before anyone noticed I haven't been getting any older.”

“I've been here forever,” Yunho admits. “But we don't go into the city often, me especially. Seonghwa likes to go, so he buys groceries. But I think he makes people see him differently, or make them forget him. Seonghwa's good at that, at looking like someone else.”

“Mm,” Yeosang nods. “Wooyoung and San are both incredible with glamours. Jongho is just... Monstrously strong. Very dextrous and very fast. His senses are incredible.”

“And you?” Yunho asks, tentatively. “Do you have a knack, Yeosang?” Yeosang cocks his head.

“I've never heard it called that before. That's a good word for it. Yes, I... I can see lines of magic. It's how we got here, I followed Seonghwa and Mingi's threads. To be fair, there are lines _everywhere _here.” Yeosang pauses. “But I'm especially interested in this one,” he lifts his fingers, holding literally nothing, but he must see something there.

“It leads out into the woods behind your home. I thought it ended here, thought you might have three companions, but. Apparently not, so there's something magical out there.”

“We should look,” Yunho says. “Once everyone is settled.”

“That's a good plan,” Yeosang says. “In the meantime, lets.. Lets get better acquainted with each other. Give ourselves some time for stories and meals.”

“Yes,” Yunho says. “So lets start with deciding where we're going to eat tonight, because you came to New Orleans, and that means you have to try _all _the food. All of it.”

Yeosang laughs, and Yunho thinks the sound is almost magical. Captivating. He can understand why those three vampires are attracted to Yeosang.

It's a very easy thing to see.

> _January 25rd, 2023._
> 
> _My name is Jeong Yunho. I've been alive since 1850._
> 
> _I think this arrangement is going to work out. That's a relief. And, unexpectedly, a joy._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i hope you're all safe and well <3
> 
> you can find my personal account on the bird app @iwriteausins!


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sexy times in this one!

> _It is February 20th, 2023._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, aged twenty years and twelve after._
> 
> _I'm finding it very easy to enjoy Yunho's company. _

“You're cheating!”

“I am _not, _you're just slow! Because you're huge!”

Yeosang watches Mingi and Jongho argue, laughing to himself from the porch. As he'd hoped just a month ago, they're getting along a little better every day. Even Wooyoung and Seonghwa, who are both extremely defensive and suspicious, have started to warm to one another. And Yunho...

Well. Yeosang is enjoying his company immensely. Even as they simply sit beside one another and rock back and forth on the porch swing. Yeosang is enjoying Louisiana. He likes the warmth, the humidity. He might not like it come summer, but the house has air conditioning, and there is always the early mornings and evenings for him to cool himself with.

The only strange thing is the pulsing of that odd thread. Yeosang is trying to ignore it, but sometimes it feels as though whatever's on the other end of it is trying to pull him toward it. He's not sure he _wants _to follow it. His dreams, which have been smeary and hazy and confusing, are also worrying him. Jaehwan has stopped by the house a few times, to speak to Yunho and drop off things Yunho ordered, and he'd offered to read the dreams, but Yeosang can't quite remember them. He only knows that when he wakes up his heart _aches _with a pain so profound he's already crying by the time he sits up. He remembers a bone-deep feeling of loneliness.

But one of his companions draws him back down to sleep, and he doesn't dream again. But still. It's odd. It's not unusual for one of the boys to have nightmares—Jongho, especially. He wakes up kicking and screaming every then and again, has to cry and be held by one of them until he calms down enough to go back to sleep. But given the violence of his turning, Yeosang isn't surprised by that.

Yeosang had thought that, perhaps because they don't know one another very well, they all would have been more reluctant to share themselves with each other. But that hasn't been the case. San and Jongho have been very open about their turning, as have Mingi and Seonghwa. It is only Wooyoung who doesn't speak of himself, but no one tries to make him. It's apparently a very private thing, one's death.

San comes barreling up the front porch, giggling, touching Yeosang's knee. “Gools!” he calls, grinning, looking back at Jongho and then up at Yeosang.

“You made that up!” Jongho shouts, but San just laughs. It warms Yeosang's heart to see them so happy. He cares for them so, so much. San turns back to him, gets up high on his knees and leans in. Yeosang bends to give him a kiss, first on his mouth, which is what he wants, and then again on his forehead. He makes a happy little humming noise, smiles enough to make his eyes crinkle up, and settles back down.

“Safe!” Mingi calls, suddenly behind them, his fingertips on Yeosang's shoulder. Yunho huffs out a laugh around his mug and Yeosang hums, reaching up to hold Mingi's hand. It's big, a little rough. His nails are painted a bright, electric red. Yeosang looks up and back at him.

“Do you need a kiss, too?” he asks, and Mingi flushes. He's very easily overwhelmed by physical affection, which is strange, considering how often he just... Flops over onto anyone he pleases. But he bends down anyway, lets Yeosang give him a soft peck on the lips. He's still blushing when he stands up.

“That's not _fair,_” Jongho complains, walking up the porch steps, stomping a little, like a kid. He's pouting, and it's adorable, and Yeosang hands his mug to Yunho so he can reach or Jongho's hand and kiss his knuckles.

“There,” he says, smiling. “Is that better?”

Jongho, still pouting, nods, and then shoves San and Mingi. “Come on, another round, and you _can't _use Yeosang as safe, that's _cheating._”

“It's not my fault you don't like kisses as much as I do,” San says, shrugging as he gets up. “Even Mingi like kisses more than you.”

“That's enough,” Yeosang says, still holding Jongho's hand. He kisses Jongho's knuckles one more time, very tenderly. “Be kind, San.”

It's San's turn to pout. He reaches out to hold Jongho's other hand. “I'm sorry,” he says, very sincerely while peeking through his hair. “That wasn't very nice of me.”

“Accepted,” Jongho says, heading back down the porch stairs with San in tow. “Come on, Mingi! We're going again!” Mingi laughs, but follows Jongho and San as Jongho announces that they have to go in the direction of the swamp this time, and if anyone gets bitten by a snake or an alligator, they have to come right back so they don't die of blood poisoning or blood loss. _And_ they lose, so they have to be the next tagger.

Yeosang laughs, taking back his mug.

Yunho hums beside him. “I think it's good,” he says. “That the boys have someone else to talk to. Mingi, especially. I think he's been lonely.”

“It's so strange, isn't it? That they're not drawn to one another in the first place? I mean, I guess there are nests, but those are necessity, not... Desire. Or so Hongbin's told me.”

“That's what Seonghwa's said, too.” Yunho brings one leg up, crosses it over the other. He's a handsome man, Yeosang thinks. There are a lot of things that give away his age—some of his mannerisms are what Yeosang would call 'classically gentleman,' though sometimes he's rougher around the edges, almost brutally down to earth. It's nice. He's more polite than anyone Yeosang's ever met, except perhaps Gunwoo. He holds doors, cooks like a professional chef, asks before he does anything, says please and thank you in a way Yeosang's companions never do. He has a good sense of humor, he laughs loud and often, but he also doesn't have the patience for outright stupidity, for impracticality. He's a man who commands respect, but also gives it.

“Tell me about him?” Yeosang asks, shifting to look at Yunho. “He killed you the first time?”

“Aah, yes,” he laughs, pushing back his hair. “I was already... Well. It wasn't legal at that time. It was considered abnormal, among people of my station as well as... Most of the others I was surrounded by.”

“Your station?”

“Aah. I was a miner. I came with a ship of Chinese workers. It was easy enough to fool the Whites. They didn't know the difference. Still don't.”

Yeosang snorts.

“So I was... Well. He was the only other man from Joseon. He didn't work in the mines or the trainyards, he was too clean for that. But he was beautiful. He made me feel..” Yunho hesitates. “Wanted, I suppose. I was fond of him. I'm ashamed to say I wrote several calligraphy pieces on the matter.” He laughs, and Yeosang laughs with him.

“I'm sure they weren't that bad.”

“They were terrible,” Yunho says. “And they certainly didn't stop him from killing me. Maybe because I reminded him of home, maybe because he was afraid to see me age and die. He's never told me. But he killed me. He was very gentle.”

Yeosang watches Yunho's eyes turn soft.

“We were... We were laying under the sky. There were so many stars there, Yeosang, not like now. You could see almost the entire universe. It was beautiful, he was beautiful. I was...” Yunho's smile is sweet with memory. “Completely overcome. He could have done anything to me in that moment.”

“Well. I did kill you.” Seonghwa says, from where he now stands behind Yunho, sliding his hands down around his neck to tip his head back. He kisses Yunho deeply on the mouth, despite the odd angle, and Yunho laughs into it.

“Stop giving away my secrets.” Seonghwa says when he pulls away, and Yunho reaches up to rub one of Seonghwa's cheeks with his knuckles.

“What? That you're a romantic?” Yunho asks, and grins when Seonghwa scowls. “Come now. You didn't think that could stay a secret forever, did you?”

“I was hoping for at least another few weeks,” Seonghwa mutters, moving around to sit in the wicker chair that's sat beside the porch swing. “Where are the children?”

“In the swamp,” Yeosang answers. “Playing tag.” Seonghwa rolls his eyes but says nothing, which Yeosang is grateful for—he's glad that Seonghwa tries not to let his greater age ruin the fun for the younger vampires.

“This is positively domestic,” Seonghwa says instead. “Vile.”

“You love it,” Yunho says. “You're glad there's someone here to distract Mingi.”

“It does mean that I get more time with you,” Seonghwa says. “When you aren't with Yeosang.”

“We have a lot to talk about.”

“Like how I seduced you to your death and was in the process of readying your body to burn when you woke?”

“Exactly like that,” Yunho laughs. He laughs so much. It's good to hear. Not that the younger vampires don't laugh, but it's good to have someone his age—someone who can understand his aging process, or lack thereof—laugh. Gunwoo had seemed incapable of laughter. Yeosang doesn't ever want to become that way. It remains one of his worst nightmares.

“You speak as though it was some romantic affair,” Seonghwa says, leaning back in the chair. “It wasn't. I was starving, you were sweet. Both in temperament and blood.”

“Yeosang is sweet-blooded also,” Wooyoung hums, bending to kiss Yeosang. “Perhaps it's an immortal thing. I have only ever known the two, so I'm unsure.”

“We could switch,” Yunho says, looking over at Wooyoung. “You could bite me, and Seonghwa could bite Yeosang.” Yeosang laughs at the way Wooyoung scrunches his nose, an expression met and matched by Seonghwa's scowl.

“What?” Yunho asks. “Don't tell me you're possessive, Seonghwa. You've never had a problem sharing me with Mingi.”

“That's Mingi,” Seonghwa mutters, sounding like a petulant child. “That's different.”

“Is it, though?” Wooyoung asks, tipping his head to one side. “I share Yeosang with San and Jongho. I don't see any reason why it should be different between you and I.”

The two of them stare at one another for a while. Yeosang looks at Yunho, who shrugs.

“I don't see why it's a big deal.”

“We should try it once,” Wooyoung says. “While the kids are gone.”

“...Once,” Seonghwa says, expression still dark. “And not a death.”

“Of course not,” Wooyoung says, rolling his eyes. “I'm not starving, and neither are you. Come on,” Wooyoung reaches out a hand for Yeosang. “Lets go inside.”

Yeosang gets up and smiles, squeezes Wooyoung's hand. He's so smitten over him. He's smitten over all of his companions, including Yunho and Seonghwa and Mingi. He's just especially fond of Wooyoung in a different kind of way.

Yeosang can hear Yunho and Seonghwa following them.

“Is there a spare room?” Wooyoung asks, looking over his shoulder. “The kids'll be upset if we use our beds.”

“Straight ahead, last door on the right.” Seonghwa says.

Wooyoung walks them there. Pushes open the door and leads Yeosang in. Yeosang hums, smiles as Wooyoung pulls him in to kiss him sweetly on the mouth. He moves away as though he's being dragged. Yeosang rolls his eyes with a laugh, kissing Wooyoung's fingers as Seonghwa prowls closer. That's a good word for it, Yeosang thinks. Prowling. If Wooyoung is a tiger shouldering through a jungle in broad daylight, Seonghwa is a panther moving through the shadows and waiting to pounce.

Seonghwa looks over to Wooyoung. They seem to share a silent statement, and Yeosang's entire vision is filled as Seonghwa pulls him in closer. None of Yeosang's charges are that much taller than he is, and it's a little overwhelming. His hands are warm as they trace up Yeosang's arms. Yeosang is only wearing a pair of loose skinnies and a t-shirt with the neck stretched, the collar long ago cut out—he's bare footed and his hair is a little messy and he feels... Vulnerable. Crowded.

“Shh,” Seonghwa breaths into his ear, fingers moving to smooth up and down Yeosang's ribs, waist and hips. “I can see that Wooyoung takes very good care of you when he bites,” Seonghwa says. Yeosang nods, licking his lips, anxious and excited despite himself.

“I shall endeavor to do the same.”

Seonghwa's bite is... It's soft and wet, and Yeosang pants, grabbing at Seonghwa's shirt and tensing all over, head bending to one side. He feels... High. Like he's floating. Then the wound is being licked, and Seonghwa's hands are running down Yeosang's body to the button and fly of his jeans.

“Wh,” Yeosang manages, breathless as Seonghwa pushes him back, and he falls onto a bed. “What?”

“I'm going to bite you like I bite Yunho,” Seonghwa says, pulling Yeosang's pants down. “Your clothes need to be off for that.”

“Oh,” Yeosang manages, his mind floating off somewhere else. He knows what's happening, he knows he is safe, he knows Wooyoung is not far, and so he lets Seonghwa pull his jeans off, pull him to the edge of the bed, push his thighs open. Being half-nude beneath Seonghwa's eyes is... It makes Yeosang hot all over.

“You are intimate with Wooyoung, are you not?” Seonghwa asks, getting between Yeosang's spread legs. Yeosang can't do anything but nod as Seonghwa lifts one thigh. “And he's never done this for you?”

“Once,” Yeosang says, and Seonghwa tuts.

“Wooyoung. Why have you not been pleasuring your lover properly.”

Wooyoung says... Something, but Yeosang's mind is off somewhere else, and he shivers when Seonghwa's lips trail up the inside of his leg, almost to his bare groin, back down. As he licks over a bit of skin and opens his mouth, presses forward to bite.

Yeosang's back arches off the bed, his eyes wide as he stares at the ceiling, fingers clawing at the blanket beside his head. He twists and tenses, panting for air as he's almost _instantly _hard. “Oh god,” he breathes, feeling Seonghwa pinning him down with his hands. He's so strong. As strong as Wooyoung.

“Good, isn't it?” Seonghwa asks, dragging himself up Yeosang's body, his fingers scratching up from Yeosang's knee, over the bite, up Yeosang's groin, his belly, his chest and up to his jaw, which he takes in hand. “Normally,” he says, casually. “This is when I fuck Yunho into the bed. Is that something you want me to do?”

“I,” Yeosang breathes, looking over, eyes darting to Wooyoung, who has Yunho pinned in much the same position. Wooyoung looks at him, reaches out his hand and Yeosang grabs it. He feels... _Physically pained _to be so close to Wooyoung but not touching him. Yeosang feels Seonghwa lick his neck, feels the drag of his teeth and closes his eyes, squeezing Wooyoung's fingers.

“Perhaps just like this then,” Seonghwa's voice is very gentle, and Yeosang feels himself getting lifted, moved closer to Wooyoung and Yunho. Yeosang's head rests near Yunho's shoulder, and Yunho's head rests near Yeosang's shoulder. Yeosang can hear that they're both panting, can almost feel Yunho's heartbeat under his ear as he turns his head.

“They're very beautiful, aren't they,” Seonghwa murmurs, and Yeosang shivers. “Our darlings.”

“Very,” Wooyoung replies, kissing Yeosang's hand, which he is still holding. “I love him desperately.”

“That is my heart beneath you,” Seonghwa says. “Be gentle with him.”

“And you,” Wooyoung replies, still holding Yeosang's hand as Seonghwa moves between his legs and just... Rocks. Slides the hardness inside his soft slacks against Yeosang's bare groin, making him arch up.

“That's lovely,” Seonghwa encourages, and Yeosang feels a hand in his hair, moving his head. He is faced with Yunho's mouth, chin and jaw. Without thinking, he leans forward and kisses Yunho. Seonghwa's movements get harder, his hands holding Yeosang's hips up, at an angle. He moves like he's fucking Yeosang. Yunho's mouth is soft and wet and Yeosang moans, gasping when Seonghwa shifts his head to bite into Yeosang's throat.

Again, his bite is so gentle. It's—it's so good. Like Wooyoung and San, it's overwhelming, and he's—he's still thrusting, though one of his hands is stroking Yeosang with a few fingers.

Yeosang grabs Wooyoung's hand so hard he feels his own knuckles pop as the pleasure of Seonghwa's touch and his bite make Yeosang cum in a hot and writhing rush, hips jerking up and down, chest heaving.

“Beautiful,” Seonghwa breathes, licking his bite closed. Yeosang falls back to the bed, panting for air, whining when Seonghwa's body leaves him until he realizes that Wooyoung is moving on top of him, closer to him.

“Yeosang,” he hums, kissing Yeosang's mouth. Yeosang arches up into him, throws his arm around Wooyoung's neck and kisses him deeply, desperately. Over, and over, and over, until he comes down from his bite and orgasm induced high. He hugs Wooyoung, reaches out to hold Yunho's hand, which is tangled up with Seonghwa's. It feels... Good. To touch them like this. It feels good. Natural.

When they're upright again—when Yeosang and Yunho have taken a shower together, blushing and laughing while Seonghwa and Wooyoung sit on the counter and bicker—Yeosang kisses each of them. Seonghwa, all teeth and dangerous grin and then Yunho, whose mouth is soft and warm.

Yes, Yeosang thinks. He could get used to Luisiana. Maybe they'll stay a little longer.

Just a little.

> _It is February 20th, 2023._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, aged twenty years and twelve after._
> 
> _I enjoy all Yunho and his companions, and all they have to offer. I think I could get used to this._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you enjoyed! i'm pretty swamped with real life nonsense this week so i'll try to update asap!


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i decided i couldn't stand the suspense kekeke  
slightly more hardcore vore here!! flesh gets eaten!!  
no one dies (permanently!)  
brief mentions of sexy things!

> _It is March 18th, 2023._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, aged twenty years and twelve after._
> 
> _My nightmares are getting worse._

It is Ostara. The spring equinox. Yeosang is awake at midnight and one minute, gasping, terrified for no reason at all. Jongho jerks awake beside him, making a small whimpering sound.

“S'all right,” Yeosang breathes, kissing Jongho's forehead, reassuringly warm under his lips. “I'm all right, go back to sleep, Jongho.”

Jongho nods, tucking back in, and Yeosang gets up to walk quietly to the bathroom. He glances at himself in the mirror. He feels... Not like himself. He feels like a ghost in his own body. Untethered, floating. Not all here.

He splashes water onto his face and glances to his left, where that little thread of magic is still pulsing, nearly three months after they got here. He hasn't had a chance to discuss following it with Yunho—and he's not sure Yunho remembers speaking about it at all. Yeosang seems like the only person who knows it's there.

_dark_

Yeosang jerks, turning around, seeing no one behind him. The word had been weak, had been soft and rasping. Nothing like any of his companions. The dialect is wrong. It sounds ancient.

_so dark_

It takes Yeosang a moment to figure out that the voice is coming from the thread he's been trying to ignore. He swallows, picking up his clothes, left on the floor before his shower last night. He pulls them on like he's under a spell. He walks back to the bedroom and reaches for the box Hongbin gave him. The one full of charms. He strings them all around his neck, where they sit properly instead of sinking into his skin because they're not meant for him. They're not meant to protect him.

But it's easier to carry them this way.

_can anyone hear_

Yeosang steps out onto the back porch, careful not to step on any creaky boards as he walks down to the dirt path, across the lawn. The moon is bright and nearly full above him and by its light he moves toward the treeline that leads into the swamp.

_please can any_

Yeosang wants to say something comforting. But he doesn't know how, so he just... Walks through the trees and into the dark, where the moonlight is fractured, the darkness cut with flashes of lightning bugs and slightly glowing mushrooms. Yunho has warned Yeosang that the swamp is magical, that it's not really safe for them if they go in too far, but Yeosang walks into it anyway. The earth is spongy under his bare feet, sinking him into wet up to his ankles, and then up to his knees as he crosses deeper spots of water. The Spanish moss and bowing trees grab at his hair, at his worn t-shirt and soft flannel. Yeosang keeps walking, almost through the trees, unable to feel them. He can see the thread getting bigger, pulsing more insistently. He can... Hear the voice in his ear, like a lover whispering.

_cold cold cold_

It's pathetic and painful. Yeosang follows the thread. He stumbles over roots and low, unexpected limbs. He pushes through the leaves of a weeping willow. How long has he been walking? Why is the moon still hanging bright above him? It's been hours, hasn't it?

_cold dark alone_

Yeosang is dizzy. He leans against the trunk of the willow and tries to remember how to breathe. The charms are heavy on his neck. Like chains.

_alone alone alone_

He moves through the leaves on the other side of the willow. He watches as the swamp becomes... Lighter. Like the color is slowly being sucked away from it. The edges of the leaves are white, the tree trunks are grey. There are no living things, no birds, no bugs. All the life has left, has fled from the sound of the voice, the terrible, terrible screaming Yeosang can hear now, almost physically. In this strange grey place the magic pulses and writhes like a trapped snake.

They're trapped, Yeosang thinks through his daze. Whatever's on the other end of this rope. They're trapped. Yeosang stops at a small stone structure in the middle of a large stone platform. There is a door with a lock. As he reaches out and touches it, the lock snaps open. It falls to the ground with a dull _thunk. _

The voice stops. Yeosang pulls on the door. He moves through the frame and in the utter darkness beyond the voice starts again, frantic, whispering, terrified and terrifying. It's raspier here, more real, though still not physically audible.

_helphelphelppleasehelpme_

Yeosang walks, heedless of the dark. He can see past it. Through it. The rope of magic is tied around his body now. It pulls him forward. Down, down, down into the depths of the earth or so it feels, to a stone room that smells of stale water and death. So many eons of death.

Candles flicker to life. Yeosang walks forward, forward, puts his hands on a stone wall. The voice is coming from the other side. It's almost completely real now, utterly real. The words in his mind are slurred and disjointed. They don't sound like real words, just noises. Maybe they were never real words at all. Maybe he just imagined them, like he's imagining all of this. Then, very suddenly, there is no voice in his head anymore.

Yeosang bends. Picks up a brick from the stone floor. With strength that is not his own, Yeosang slams the brick against the wall. Hears a frightened rasp of a scream from the other side. Slams it again, eyes half-closed, slowly crossing. He's so tired, why is he so tired?

There is dry whimpering now. Desperate. The tiny pull of chain. A broken little wail that's more air than anything else. The strain of a body trying to get free. The sounds of a tethered prisoner trying to escape a well before they drown.

Yeosang makes a hole in the brick. He reaches inside and pulls out. The wall seems to crumble under the force of his unnatural strength. He moves faster, pulls harder, hears the whimpering becoming desperate little noises, encouragement, pleas without words. Yeosang hates the sound of suffering.

He rips out most of the stonework and steps through.

Chained on the opposite side of the tiny, dark room is a small creature swathed in shadow. Yeosang moves closer, the rope of magic tight on his body, drawing him closer, like a trap. Yeosang reaches out to touch—the creature jerks, snarls, thrashes in its chains. There are so many. So many chains, keeping it trapped on its knees, against the wall.

A vampire, Yeosang thinks but... It's wrong. It's wrong, somehow.

“Shh,” Yeosang breathes, unable to feel himself speaking, the shape of his lips, the movement of air over them. “Shh, shh.”

The vampire has a mask over its eyes and... A bit between its teeth. Its monstrous teeth. It looks like an animal, like a horror movie creature with its three sets of top canines and its two bottom sets, its lips and tongue cracked and dry like its skin is cracked and dry. It looks like it was made of clay then left out in the sun.

“Wait,” Yeosang whispers, his fingers moving, feeling to either side of the vampire's head. It flails and thrashes, frantic and weak. Yeosang touches its cold, hollow cheeks. He smooths its hair, dirty and matted beneath his fingers. “Shh, wait.”

In a dream, Yeosang unbuckles the horrible, horrible bit and drags the mask away from the vampire's face. It's grey all over, except its eyes. Its eyes are bright silver-white encircled by a ring of what might be black? Yeosang can't quite see it in the dark.

It stares at Yeosang, dry tongue on its dry lip, and Yeosang moves closer. Gets on his knees. Reaches forward to wrap his wrists in some of the looser chains. To keep him upright. The vampire pants like it still needs to breathe.

“Feed,” Yeosang breathes, and gasps when he is bitten, bitten hard and unforgiving, chewed at, torn. The chains on his arms are the only thing holding him up before long. He's dying and still, the vampire rips his flesh away, bites, chews, swallows. Yeosang can hear it swallowing. Feels it moves to the other side of his throat to bite into him. Yeosang sinks into death, and the vampire is still eating, still sucking, still gnawing.

Yeosang loses track of his deaths. He stays there on his knees for an age, or maybe it's only an hour. As the vampire regains its strength it starts to pull on its restraints and, as Yeosang is coming back from a death, he hears metal strain and snap. Feels himself shoved to the cold, cold earth. Feels vicious claws, vicious hands, vicious bites all over his body now, arms and belly and thighs and throat. Like he's a corpse to be eaten.

After a thousand deaths, Yeosang wakes. He wakes to a cold floor and a warm body. To lips pressing fervent kisses to his neck, his mouth. To fingers in his hair and a body, a small body, straddling over his own. To warm, rasping breath against his skin and silent words that echo through his mind.

_savior my savior my king my god_ there is a head under his chin, a cheek on his neck like a cat. _what a miserable hell you have saved me from what pleasures i will grant you anything everything all that you wish of me and more_

The voice. Yeosang heard this voice over the thread. The thread that had turned into a rope, that now ties him to this... This vampire. This vampire, frantically dragging its lips across Yeosang's neck and throat and cheeks. Yeosang makes a soft noise, and the vampire sits up. It's a man, Yeosang sees now. A young man. Smaller than he is, with a long tangle of wild white hair. Eyes that had been a bright silver-white are now a pale, warm brown. Like coffee with too much cream.

His entire face is smeared with blood, from his eyes to his lips and down his chin. He reaches to rub it away but only makes more of a mess. He's... Unclothed? Or perhaps his clothes have mostly just rotted off, who knows how long he's been down here in the dark, alone. Desperately calling, screaming, crying.

Yeosang thinks of his dreams. Of waking up feeling abandoned and terrified without knowing why. Yeosang looks up at him and sees... Perhaps not a child, but someone who is afraid like a child. Like he thinks Yeosang is going to leave him here, brick him back up behind that wall to be forgotten.

So Yeosang reaches up, feeling very weak and tired, and presses his hand to the vampire's cheek. The vampire presses Yeosang's hand closer with his own, turns his face to it, kisses Yeosang's thumb and palm with such awe that it makes Yeosang shiver. Another wave of tears slides down the vampire's face, onto Yeosang's hand, down his wrist.

“You're...” Yeosang's voice cracks. “You're going to have to feed again,” he says, breathing slowly. How many times has he died? How long has it been? Hours, maybe. Days? The vampire nods, but keeps pressing kisses to Yeosang's hand. Fervent, reverent kisses, as though feeding is the last thing on his mind, like worshipping Yeosang is more important.

“Please,” Yeosang says, even as his eyes close because he's just so tired. “Please. Feed.” Yeosang feels hands on the back of his neck, cradling his head. He feels a soft, tender mouth on his neck. Feels the slightest, sharpest bite and then the soft, delicate suck of a vampire not frantic to feed, but needing a meal. He hears a quiet litany in his mind like whispered prayers from a room away.

_thank you thank you you saved me you saved me my king all you ask of me will be done i am yours to command to control thank you my sweet and merciful savior i am but a wretch beneath your sight but i am yours only yours always yours_

Yeosang can't do anything but wrap his arms around the warm, soft body above his own. He just... Lets the vampire drink from him, lets him kiss and tongue and suck his neck. Feels the vampire shift only enough to kiss down his body, to take in Yeosang's erection (it feels like an automatic response to a bite, now) and suck, slick and messy. Yeosang hears the vampire swallow when he orgasms. Feels him lay between Yeosang's spread legs, rest his bare chest against Yeosang's groin and hug him over the hips, hands in little fists on Yeosang's waist.

Yeosang reaches down and runs his fingers over that messy, matted hair. He listens to that tenbrous, tenuous voice in his mind, the chants of thanks and prayers that are in rhythm with his own breathing until he falls asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ;D


	19. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey!! hey there's some more vore-type stuff! flesh eating! descriptions of violence! implications of sexual assault!! i earn that tragic backstories tag!!
> 
> (this isn't like. A CHAPTER, imo, but that's okay, i hope u like it anyway!)

It's so dark.

He, undying, has been in the dark for so long. Screaming. Screaming, begging, pleading.

No one comes.

Not his Master, not his maker, not his destroyer. They are all one and the same, or perhaps they simply seemed as though they were. He can't remember anymore. It's been so long.

The chains are cold and the room is a coffin. He suffocates but cannot die. The oppressive darkness is heavy on his chest, against his mind. He feels himself atrophying. His clever brain, once his Master's pride despite—or perhaps because of—his enslavement, is destroyed by silence and nonexistent threats and the cold.

He's so, so cold. So alone.

He cannot recall ever being so alone. Though perhaps, in many ways, he has been alone forever. Always.

Insanity creeps through him. He fights it off, fights for the Sleep, and sometimes it is granted to him. Sometimes he Sleeps, but he has no way of telling how long it's been. How long he's been gone.

His hair is growing out. He cannot snap it the way he can snap his fingernails between the links of chain. It hurts, but there are worse pains.  
There are always worse pains.

The pain of betrayal. The pain of abandonment. The pain of fear so deep in his body it is a part of his bones, splintering them from the inside out. Fear of being alone. Of never being found. Of being made into what he is and being, truly, undying. At least before this he could hold out a hope.

Not anymore. Whenever... Anymore, is.

He grows weaker as time passes. So tired, so hungry. The Sleep only replenishes so much when the body is so ruined. For the first time in a millennia, he cries out. His true voice can no longer make words. His tongue and throat are dry with the bit and the mask. His teeth are so sensitive that breathing over them is painful. But his mind reaches. Begs. Pleads, cries. Any attempts for bravery or bravado or confidence have long been ripped away and he is a shameless, miserable worm fit only to be buried in the ground, crushed under a boot if only someone would grant him that mercy. Death would be merciful. That's why he's here. Because he has never been granted mercy.

Somehow, despite his lack of food, of blood, he never seems to run out of tears. But perhaps they are human tears, all he has left of his mortality. He can't tell. Everything smells of new salt and old blood and ancient stone.

He vows to himself that if anyone ever comes for him, he will be their slave. Eternally in their debt. Theirs forever, or as long as they will have him. So long as they take him away, or kill him in any way they can instead of leaving him here in this miserable, terrible, suffocating nothingness.

It takes so much strength to call. To let his trembling, wretched voice vibrate through his mind in hopes that someone, _anyone, _will hear him.

An eternity passes. Just himself in the dark, in the cold, alone with his crumbling mind and his withering soul, what little of that he has left. If he ever had any of it to begin with. He's sure that many dead would agree that he's never had any at all.

So much for the _Great Undying Beast. _What is he now? He can't think of the words. There used to be words. They're all gone now, won't come out from between his cracked lips.

Then.

Then, as he hangs there, a vibration. A tiny, tender vibration like fingers in his hair and he stirs, quivers. For the first time in so many lifetimes, there is... Someone there.

He tries to cry out, but his voice will not come. It won't come out of his scratched, dead throat but it comes from his mind. He screams and cries and begs. He's so cold and it's so dark and he's so achingly alone. It is shameless. Wretched. Pathetic. Was he not once a warrior, a Monster, pride and terror of his Master's army?

Does any of that matter, anymore?

So he screams, screams and screams. Nearly tearless sobs and weak, weak thrashing in his restraints, the cursed chains that restrain him. The betrayers had to drug him to bury him here. His Master had to take him with subterfuge because not he nor his men, none of them, could have harmed him. Not really. None of them would have been able to take him by force. Not after the Change, and likely not before, either.

Little by little, the vibration grows stronger. It grows, and grows, until finally it becomes solid. Firm and real. Until he dares, dares to hope, for the first time in a million eternities.

There is a heartbeat.

There is a heartbeat and it moves towards him, louder louder louder. It sounds like a war drum.

_please _he begs. His first truly coherent thought in a thousand millennia. _please do not leave me here_

He makes a sound when brick strikes brick. He struggles when the stones fall, when he feels... A man, on the other side of the wall. The source of the heartbeat. Warm, real flesh, real body. Real man. The man unbuckles the cruel harness around his head. A man, soft-eyed and dreaming and beautiful. The man kneels before him. His merciful Savior draws his disgusting face in close to the curve of his own vulnerable throat.

“Feed,” the man urges, and he does.

He does feed. Ravenously. Viciously. Bones snapped and crushed by his teeth. Flesh torn and blood drunk until he can rip his arms out of the restraints regardless of the magic holding him in place. He gorges himself on flesh because he has been so hungry for so long, because he is past starvation, because—because the man is like he once used to be and wakes, again and again and again, always urges, _feed, feed. _Sometimes he vomits for eating so much. He eats the bloody pieces, because there is no bile in his stomach to dirty it, only the blood of his Savior. He can't stop, he can't. It's been so long. So long. He's so hungry. Starved. Dry and brittle and clawed, ripping away flesh to eat between wakings. To chew and gnaw and _savor._ And as he feeds, he learns. Words, new words. Similar, and yet different to his own. Words and things and warmth, for the first time in so long there is warmth, physical and mental. It moves through his mind and body in a diaphanous curl the colors of the northern sky.

Eventually, the need for broken bones and ripped flesh gives way to the need for blood. Long, slow sucks from the neck, his small body fitting easily on top of his Savior. His hands cradle his Savior's head. The hair is so smooth, so soft beneath his warm, dry hands. His Master looks like an angel. Even with his skin splattered in blood and leftover remnants of gore. He licks it away, cleans him. They are surrounded by the carnage on the cold clay and he picks it up, eats every last spare scrap slowly. To taste it, truly taste it. His Master looks like an angel. Tastes like an angel, sweet and warm and sparkling in his mouth. He kisses frantically at the soft, soft skin.

_savior my savior my king my god _he feels his mind reach when his mouth still cannot remember how to form words. _what a miserable hell you have saved me from what pleasures i will grant you anything everything all that you wish of me and more_

His Master simply cups his cheek in a hand so tender it only makes him weep further. How long as it been since a touch has graced his skin, how long has it been since a hand touched him without the intent to harm and bruise or punish and whip, to use or _kill—_

His Master reaches again, and he turns to press that hand harder against his cheek, presses kisses against it, willing to do _anything _so long as that hand remains gentle, doesn't harm him. Doesn't put him back in those chains, behind that stone. He will give every part of himself to stay warm.

He cries again.

“You're...” His Savior's voice cracks. “You're going to have to feed again.”

He can only kiss that palm like a slave, can only feel that skin beneath his lips, which have not felt so wet in years, in a millennia, in an eternity. Would that he could kiss this entire body, from that dark and beautiful hair to the soles of his Master's feet.

“Please,” His Savior whispers, as though this miserable creature could ever do him favors or graces. “Please. Feed.”

He kisses that hand, that wrist, until he has shifted enough to lift the man's neck, his head. Holds him so carefully because he is something precious, he is someone important, his God. His giving, tender, merciful God who has pulled him from the terrors of the solitary dark and given him a heartbeat to hear, a body to worship.

_thank you _he whispers in his mind._ thank you you saved me you saved me my king all you ask of me will be done i am yours to command to control thank you my sweet and merciful savior i am but a wretch beneath your sight but i am yours only yours always yours_

His Savior holds him so close until the need for blood, too, gives way. It takes an eternity but this one is not painful, not a punishment. It is a healing. It makes room for the forgotten need for tenderness, for care. He hugs his Savior to his chest, kisses his hair, strokes his face with his small, bloody hands. He can feel that he's crying but he simply takes a few more gentle pulls, not enough to kill his Savior, not enough to make his gut burst as it had before. His Master is hard when he does this, gives those few bites. He draws his Savior into his mouth, takes him in easily. He is familiar with this kind of giving, also. It was once required of him. He, more than once, has died giving it, and other pleasures that had been required of him once the men were in their tents and he was alone with his betrayers.

He makes quiet pleasured sounds of encouragement. He swallows and shivers. Hugs himself close with an ear to his Master's belly, hands on his waist. Even from where he lays he can hear his Master's heartbeat. It makes him tremble. It's incredible to even hear a heartbeat after so long. To hear anything except his own unnecessary breathing after so horribly, horribly long.

He weeps to hear anything at all.

He lays there on the cold ground, so glad he can feel the difference between the cold clay and the warmth of the man's legs to either side of his body, feels the air shift around them. He spreads his hands so he can feel warm skin, the smoothness of it. He cries quietly, not wanting to disturb his Savior's sleep.

Oh, to sleep the sleep of tender dreams, of quiet comfort instead of dark emptiness of the Sleep of the Undying. He falls into that gentle sleep of dreams, listening to his Savior's heartbeat. He is unable to keep his eyes open. His belly is full, his body smooth and filled like it hasn't been in so many long, terrible years.

All because of this man.

His Savior.

His Master.

His God.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> W E L P


	20. Chapter 20

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> no warnings! enjoy~

Wooyoung wakes at one in the afternoon in a bed with San and Jongho, but not Yeosang.

Normally this wouldn't be a concern. Normally, Yeosang would be out in the kitchen with Yunho, talking, or out in the back garden, just watching the trees move with the wind. But Yeosang is not here.

Wooyoung can feel that, hear that. Yeosang is not here. His heartbeat is nowhere to be found.

Wooyoung jerks up, panting, throws himself from the bed and runs to the kitchen, then the back porch, then to the room Yunho shares with Seonghwa and Mingi. Yeosang is not there. He is nowhere.

“Wooyoung?” Seonghwa asks, blinking, squinting at him. “Wooyoung, what—?”

“Yeosang's not here,” he says, his entire body shaking with panic. If he had a heartbeat, it would be racing. “Yeosang's _not here._”

“What?” Seonghwa asks, pushing himself up out of the bed as Yunho and Mingi groan awake. “What do you mean?”

“He's _not here,_” Wooyoung hears his own desperation, feels his mouth twisting around it, feels tears already on his face. “He's gone, Seonghwa he's gone I don't—”

“Gone?” Seonghwa walks to him and reaches out. Cups both hands around Wooyoung's trembling jaw and neck and closes his eyes. It's what Seonghwa is able to do, feel and know things that other people feel and know, so long as they are open to his touch, so long as they are ready to give him the information.

Wooyoung gives him the information. He feels Seonghwa's body give a ripple of fear.

“All right,” he says, his voice rasping, hand pressed to his chest. “All right, we... We need to find him. Where could he have gone?”

“I don't _know,_” Wooyoung almost wails because he's afraid, he's so afraid. The bed had been cold, Yeosang's body long gone, had he woken up in the night? Had he walked into town, had he—had he walked into the swamp? There are only two directions to go in. Unless he made his own?

“All right,” Seonghwa nods. Wooyoung can tell that he's panicked, too. They've all grown so much closer over the last three months. Like a real family. “Which of us has the strongest senses?”

“Jongho and Mingi,” Wooyoung says. “I'll get Jongho.”

He turns and runs to the other end of the house. San and Jongho are already sitting up, blinking, frowns of confusion on their faces. He doesn't want to alarm them, he doesn't want to frighten them, but the words are spilling out of him before he can stop them.

“Yeosang is missing,” he says, throat terribly dry. “Jongho get—get up, we need—we need you to—”

Jongho nods, getting out of bed, yanking on a pair of joggers and a t-shirt as he, and then San, follow Wooyoung out into the large greatroom that separates the two sides of the house. Everyone is standing there, all six of them, sleep-rumpled and confused and worried.

Mingi is frowning, his eyes closed, head tilting to one side.

“I can't...” He grits his teeth, trying to feel the vibrations in the air, much like how someone might tip their head to hear soft music better. He's told Wooyoung all about how it works. “There's so much feedback, I... Swamp, he went into the swamp, that's—that's all I can feel I'm sorry, I—”

“It's a good start,” Wooyoung says, looking at Yunho and Seonghwa. “Lets pair up. We can search the swamp, he can't have gotten far. Especially if he was sleep-walking or something, he wouldn't be able to navigate the trees.”

“Yeah,” San nods, head jerking. “He—it gets so dense, there's no way he could get past all those trees. We can't even get past them when we're awake!”

“But what if—”

“All right,” Yunho says, taking a deep breath. “Calm down. Panicking isn't going to help. Jongho, you go with Mingi. We'll be able to find the two of you, even if you take off. San and Wooyoung, you take the the left side, Seonghwa and I'll take the right. If you find anything, holler. One of us will hear. Okay?”

All of them nod, because Yunho is the caretaker here and if he has a plan then they're going to follow it. Wooyoung grabs San's hand and takes off for the left side of the swamp. Neither of them have shoes on, not that it really matters.

For a while they can hear the others, can hear the sticks breaking under their feet and the water splashing around their ankles. Then eventually the sounds fade away and it's just Wooyoung and San holding on to one another tightly, their fingers laced. It's getting dark. Why is it getting dark? Why are all the trees turning grey?

“Wooyoung,” San whispers. “Wooyoung why—”

“I don't know,” he answers, before San can finish asking.

“Do you think something took him?”

“Maybe.”

“He wouldn't leave us.”

“No.”

The swamp is hot and sticky. The water is warm and the moss is squishy and the thorns and branches are sharp despite the lack of color, of sound. There is no sound but their own and the others. Wooyoung listens carefully as their running slows to jogging, and then to walking. They reach a wall of trees so dense and close they can barely pass through it, and San clenches onto Wooyoung's hand. Wooyoung looks back at him.

“I'm scared,” San whispers, standing just behind him in the strange, disorienting twilight, all the grey. San is the only color he can see. “Don't let go of me. Please? This place feels weird.”

Wooyoung nods, squeezes San's hand to comfort him. This places feels strange. Wooyoung can feel... Something. Something vibrating in the air. It's heavy and scary and he doesn't want to keep going but he'd been calling Yeosang's name and there hadn't been any response except some distant alligators bellowing, a few birds calling, bugs buzzing and chirping and chittering all around them.

But now there isn't even that. Everything is so silent, so still.

There is a guttural, terrified scream and an ear-piercing shriek.

Wooyoung doesn't bother to stop and think about whether or not it's Yeosang. Someone is screaming, one of his friends is screaming, and he holds hard to San's hand as they both take off toward the sound, fighting around the trees and the silence and the vibrations that get stronger and stronger and stronger as they move into a clearing, and then onto a pristine, white stone platform. The sun reflecting off it is absolutely blinding and on it is perched small stone building. It looks terribly out of place here, in the middle of a swamp in Louisiana. It looks like something that belongs in a history book and how—how did the sun come back out, wasn't it—wasn't it dark in the trees, just a moment ago? It was dark and grey, Wooyoung knows it was dark but it's not dark out here. Like the clouds have parted to place a glow here and here alone, warming the trees to shades of green and brown.

Mingi and Jongho are there on the platform—Mingi on his backside and Jongho right behind him on his knees, staring at the door of the building. It's half-off its hinges, broken. Yunho and Seonghwa are bursting through the other side of the clearing, and Yunho nearly trips on the platform.

“Are you—”

“There's something in there,” Jongho breathes, pants. “There's—Yeosang is in there but there's something—I can't tell what it is it's—it's a fucking monster or something I don't—”

Wooyoung looks at Seonghwa. The two of them are the oldest vampires.

“Go to Yunho,” Wooyoung tells San. San shakes his head, and squeezes his hand tighter. “Go to Yunho_, _San. _Now_. Bring Mingi and Jongho with you.” San licks his lips, lets go of Wooyoung's hand even though his own is shaking. He staggers forward, grabbing both of the younger vampires by the clothes and dragging them back. Wooyoung watches them stumble back to Yunho, all crowded at his legs like children.

Wooyoung takes a slow step toward the door. Seonghwa does, too. Another, another. Carefully the two of them walk towards the door. Wooyoung, on the side with the hinges, and reaches out. Pulls it open as Seonghwa glances around the doorframe. He shakes his head to indicate that he doesn't see anything, and Wooyoung pulls the door further open. He moves to look inside.

Stairs. Stairs leading down, with small candles burning on the walls at either side.

With a tremble of fear, Wooyoung steps through the doorframe. Onto the stairs, and then—then, Yeosang's voice. A soft and gentle lilt, a reassuring tone.

“Yeosang?” he calls, and there is a sound. A scramble, a... Noise that sounds like a child whimpering. A very, very dehydrated child, throat dry and torn.

“I'm okay,” Yeosang calls back up the stairs. Wooyoung can't see him. “I'm okay, Wooyoung, just—just give me a minute, you're scaring him.”

Him? Wooyoung looks at Seonghwa, who stares back and shrugs helplessly. So Wooyoung steps up the stairs and out of the doorway, waits to one side. He listens, his eyes wide and his heart pounding. He hears steps, soft. Bare-footed. Hears Yeosang speaking quietly.

“There, there it's all right, come on. You can trust me, come on, it's all right. It's all right, shh. Shh, don't be afraid, you're safe. I'm sorry they frightened you but you're safe, I promise, my friends are at the top of the stairs, that's all. No one's going to hurt you, you're safe.”

More sounds. More whimpering, sand scraping over stone.

“Don't you trust me?”

Something like a sob. Wooyoung stares at Seonghwa. Seonghwa stares at the darkness. His eyes are wide and set, his body tense as though waiting to leap on whoever comes through the frame. Wooyoung probably looks the same.

Then Yeosang's back is in view. He's in his clothes from yesterday, and they're _covered _in blood. Soaked with it. Wooyoung can almost taste the blood from where he stands. Readies himself to fight whatever comes up out of that staircase if he needs to.

He can see that Yeosang is holding the hands of... Whatever's in there with him. Can see, as Yeosang moves around the curves of the stairs, that the thing he's touching is small and pale and absolutely filthy. It _smells _filthy. Like death and fear and agony and eternity. The first true graveyards of men.

“It won't hurt you,” Yeosang is reassuring, as though the thing he's guiding is speaking to him. “I swear it won't hurt you. That's what the necklaces were for. It won't hurt you, I promise. I promise.” Yeosang is almost up the curve of the staircase. Seonghwa has a better view than Wooyoung, who can't see around the remains of the door, and Wooyoung watches his eyes widen in confusion. Perhaps it's not a threat, then, whatever it is.

“I know you're scared,” Yeosang says. “I know, but you're safe. I promise you're safe.”

Seonghwa backs away, and Wooyoung follows the motion, stepping back. Giving Yeosang space as he speaks softly to the—to the creature? The man? He's leading it up the stairs. It's a man or something like it, Wooyoung can see. A small, shaking creature who is hunched in on itself, the top of its head pressed to Yeosang's chest, wrists caught in Yeosang's hands. Yeosang's grip isn't tight, Wooyoung can see that, but the creature is shaking like it's in shackles. The vampire, Wooyoung realizes. Its face is covered in blood, as are its hands, neck and chest. It's only wearing the barest tatters of clothing, practically nude. Its hair is a tangled mess. Its skin, nearly in the sunlight, looks smooth and pale as marble.

Yeosang glances up at Wooyoung, his eyes bright and sad and worried. He licks his lips and takes a deep breath like he's preparing for something painful, and yanks the vampire out of the darkness and into the sun.

Wooyoung's ears ring and his heart _aches _for the way the vampire screams in fear, trying to jerk back, trying to get away, back to the safety of the dark. He is _horrified _by the way the vampire writhes and contorts and twists to make itself as small as it can, trying to hide in Yeosang's shadow as it sobs wretchedly, trembling all over in a way that speaks of atrophied and over-tense muscles vibrating with strain.

Yeosang gets to his knees, lets the vampire crowd him but doesn't let go, doesn't let it flee. Just kneels there, biting his own lip, squeezing his eyes closed like this is hurting him as much as it's hurting... That pathetic thing crying against his body, its hands limp, shaking. Claws broken off, some ripped out at the roots. Wooyoung has never seen one of his kind in... In such condition, wordless, keening in terror, weeping in desperation to live.

It... He, Wooyoung forces himself to think, _he, _is so... Small. So thin, so delicate-looking when his head turns this way and that, shaking, teeth bared. His _teeth. _His teeth are positively monstrous. They're huge, and he has three sets of them—three pairs of top canines, and two pair on the bottom. Wooyoung has never seen a vampire with teeth like that. They look more like the teeth of a dog, or a hyena.

“You're all right,” Yeosang whispers, sounding weak as he does when he's over-taxed himself feeding the three of his charges. “You're all right, look. Look at me.”

He does. Wooyoung watches that wretched form look up at Yeosang like Yeosang hung the moon and all the stars in the sky. He looks at his hands, which Yeosang has raised. They are in the sun, and they aren't burning.

Wooyoung remembers when he'd put his hands into the sun after over sixty years in the dark. He'd been so afraid, no matter what any of them had said, and when he'd felt it—that warmth, the heat, seen the light streaming through his fingers—he'd cried like a baby until San came to find him and laugh, lead him out onto the small balcony so they could sit in the sun together, holding hands.

That's what this vampire looks like, now. Full of wonder, aborted fear, shaking as Yeosang scoots back further, stretching out the vampire's arms to unlock them from their tense and trembling position. To pull him out of the dark. “Come on,” Yeosang says, and his voice is so, so gentle. “Come on, it's okay. You're safe, I _promise._”

The vampire is weeping. Silently, mouth open, blinking his eyes rapidly, though its tears don't seem to be made of blood alone. Real tears, human tears, are dripping. The fluids are mixed. He slowly relaxing his hands, then his arms. He crawls after Yeosang, slowly easing into the midday sun, looking around as though he sees nothing but the light, the trees and the sky and the fluffy clouds overhead.

Then his eyes land on Wooyoung. They're the color of coffee with too much cream, and they light up with terror as he jerks out of Yeosang's grip and back into the dark, scrabbling desperately through the doorframe, disappearing. Wooyoung jerks back too—he'd expected some kind of reaction but not—not that. Not _fear. _

“No,” Yeosang says, his voice a trembling coo as he moves back into the structure, taking the vampire by the hands again. Wooyoung backs further away, as does Seonghwa.

“No no, come on, it's okay, you're safe. They're not going to hurt you, they're not. Shh, shh. Don't you trust me?” There is a moment of terrible silence. “Then why are you afraid?

“Don't be afraid. Come with me.” Yeosang's voice gains a firmness, though a kind one. The voice he uses when he wants what's best and you're too stubborn to admit that he's right. “They won't hurt you. I swear they won't. Come out of this dark.”

It's easier the second time, though the vampire is still cringing. But the warmth of the sun must comfort him, remaining alive in its light must give him faith in what Yeosang says, because he steps back out. His eyes dart to Wooyoung and he doesn't jerk violently, though he does flinch. In the light, his hair is so white as to be a shining silver.

“Wooyoung,” Yeosang says, his voice still firm. “Come here, please.” It's almost a command, but not quite. It's as though Yeosang is trying to prove something to the trembling figure in his arms. So Wooyoung moves easily, slowly, to his side. The vampire is not so small as he'd first assumed. Certainly small, but not tiny. He's just curled in on himself in a way that looks painful. Like he's trying to fit his entire body into his own ribcage.

“This is Wooyoung,” Yeosang says. “He's a vampire too, look. Look at him.”

Those pale eyes, unblinking, look at him. Beneath his filth Wooyoung sees the ghost of something. An echo of something that used to exist, but has been crushed. Something that might never be there again. Firm strength. Determination. It's taking all of this poor creature's willpower to keep looking at him, forcing himself to look into Wooyoung's eyes, trying to be as fearless as he once probably was.

But he looks away first, eyes falling half-closed. He looks down at Wooyoung's bare feet and doesn't look back up.

“Good,” Yeosang praises, smoothing the dirty hair. “That's good. Come on. I'm going to bring you somewhere safe. You're going to meet my family. Yes, my family. You're safe. They won't harm you. You surprised them, that's all. They weren't expecting you. They surprised you too, didn't they?”

To Wooyoung's utter astonishment, the vampire nods, quick and nervous.

“You don't need to be afraid. You're safe.” Yeosang kisses the vampire's forehead. The vampire closes his eyes as though he is receiving some kind of blessing. “Wooyoung is going to hold your hand,” Yeosang looks over at Wooyoung and Wooyoung offers his hand, because what the hell else is he going to do? This clearly terrified and traumatized vampire needs a hand to hold and so he'll offer his at Yeosang's request, though he probably would have done it anyway.

The poor thing is just so _frightened. _

It takes a moment, but a small, pale and shaking hand settles against Wooyoung's own tanned skin. To his surprise, the vampire tangles their fingers together, squeezing as though he expects Wooyoung to pull away. Wooyoung just squeezes back.

“That's right,” Yeosang says, very gently. “He _is_ very warm. Now. We're going to walk you home, okay? No, not there. Away. Yes.” He kisses the vampire's forehead again. “Yes, you'll be safe there, too. Come on.”

Wooyoung realizes that Yeosang's over-shirt, his flannel, is wrapped around the vampire's waist, knotted to one side to afford him some kind of modesty. He's not nude, as Wooyoung had thought. But he remains hunched over, hiding behind Yeosang as Yeosang looks over to Wooyoung and gives him a look of such warm gratitude that his heart aches. Wooyoung looks to Seonghwa, but he and Yunho are already out of the line of sight, herding the others back to the house. They no longer look afraid, but curious as they peek back, and Wooyoung is grateful for Seonghwa's sensitivity on the matter. No doubt he'd heard everything, Mingi too.

It's a long walk back to the house. Very long, very slow. It feels like a hundred thousand years as they walk back through the grey and silent swamp, returning to the green, the sounds of animals and bugs and water. Yeosang talks about the others, responds to questions as though the vampire is actually asking them.

“Mm, our oldest is Seonghwa. Wooyoung is our second oldest. Then San, Mingi, and Jongho. Yes, I suppose their names are strange, aren't they? But names change with time. Of course you can call them by name, just like you can call me by name. I know, but you don't have to. Do you remember your name? No, not that. That is not, was never, your name. Never. When you do remember, then. That's all right, there's no rush. We have time.”

Wooyoung doesn't interject, has no idea what he'd say even if he _was _involved in the conversation, if he's honest. So he just lets the vampire hold on to him, occasionally squeezing his hand when blood and saltwater tears overflow his eyes. Waits when the vampire stops in a beam of sunlight just to tip his head up and look into the leaves in wondrous awe.

It's... It's beautiful, Wooyoung thinks. To see someone experience this thing that's made him so happy since he first came to Yeosang.

“What's your name,” he asks, as they come to the edge of the yard and the vampire looks at the house, at the grass, at the sun and the freedom of a truly open space. He doesn't expect an answer. If anything, he expects Yeosang to ask again, and then give him one, if he has one at all.

So Wooyoung jerks a little in surprise when he hears, whispered into his mind like a breath of summer wind,

_hongjoong_

And Wooyoung is surprised even further by the smile that starts to pull Hongjoong's lips and show his teeth, his ancient, terrifying teeth. He looks like a child, he looks... Like something small and precious you'd forgotten and now are holding tight in your grasp, afraid to lose it again. He squeezes down on Wooyoung's hand, his eyes bright and shining with awe and delight and happiness despite his filth, the blood on his skin seems to be washed away in the brilliance of the afternoon sun.

_my name is hongjoong_

> _It is March 19th, 2023._
> 
> _Here continues the record of Kang Yeosang, aged twenty years and twelve after._
> 
> _Ostara has brought me a very strange gift, indeed. I found something incredible in the swamp. Or rather, someone. I've never seen someone so ruined in my life._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :D


	21. Chapter 21

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is unedited!  
there are no warnings except for more tragic backstory stuff!! scars, talk of past trauma, that kind of thing.

Light!

There is so much _light, _so much _color! _

Oh, to see the blessed earth around him, to feel it under his feet—to be holding a hand, lifeless as his own but still so warm. To look into the eyes of the Undying walking at his side and know that he is _safe, _that he is not going to be harmed.

Home, his Master had said. He is being taken _home. _How long has it been since these words have had meaning, how long has it been since his Undying heart has felt so _full?_

His Master leads him to an open space, where the sun beams down. He has not seen the sun in eons, has not walked in its warmth and light for an eternity of dark and misery. He weeps to see it, weeps to _feel _it.

“What's your name,” asks Wooyoung the Undying.

_hongjoong _he whispers with his mind, voice soft with awe and reverence. He can feel that he is smiling, can feel that his lips are stretching across his teeth and it doesn't crack them, doesn't tear open any wounds, does not make him feel like he is flaking away, slowly coming to pieces.

_my name is hongjoong _

And his Master is merciful, lets him collapse to his knees, overwhelmed and so full of happiness and relief and—

He bows his head. Kisses his Masters hand and that of his Undying companion. Wooyoung. Wooyoung the Undying, whose skin tastes like summer, he _remembers _summer. Feels it now, beating down onto his back and so hot, the ground beneath him is hot and wet with water. Water, real water. Not little lines of moisture that seep from cold stones. Water of the earth. He wishes he could drink it, still. But how little it is to give up, when he can once again see the sun above his head?

Who is he to beg for more when his Master has given him so, so much? He is unworthy of this gift, of his Master's kindness, of the kindness of Wooyoung the Undying, crouching beside him, first rubbing his back with great tenderness, then with more firmness. A warm hand, the hand of a companion, a friend. He sobs like the wretch he is. Neither his Master nor Wooyoung the Undying try to haul him up, whip him to move him faster, drag him by his hair across this soft, smooth ground though he expects even that would be a pleasure on his skin.

“There,” his Master says, still holding his hand though he does not deserve it. He pulls both of their hands in close to his chest, makes himself small, prostrates himself for their mercy should they choose to punish him for his audacity to kiss their fingers, to press his unclean mouth to their unblemished skin. He rocks up and down, hearing himself making noise but unable to formulate words with his mouth and throat. He can only speak them with his mind.

_thank you _he whispers as he cries, cries, cries like a pathetic child. _oh master you are merciful to bless me thus what have i done to deserve this gift, this pleasure please forgive me i this unworthy whoreson deserves nothing more than to die here in your graces_

“Shh,” his Master says, kneeling before him, deigning to put himself on the level of a slave, a filthy and desecrated blight upon the earth herself. “Shh,” His Master says, cupping his cheek as he had in his prison.

“Hongjoong. Don't say these things of yourself. Please. They are untrue.”

He dares not say that his Master speaks wrongly. His word is absolute. He bows his head to rest on the ground before his Master's knees. He should never be on the same level. He should never sit higher than his Savior. He exposes his neck for carving, for punishment as his betrayer might have forced him to do. He readies himself for a knife, or a burn.

But there is only the soft press of his Master's lips there. Only the warmth of his mouth and tongue as though his Master is trying to erase his past shame. The Great Undying Beast. The favored whore of his betrayer, helpless but to obey him. Has he not always been a wretched waste? Has he not earned nothing more than to eat with pigs and lay with the dogs? To be chained by the throat until he is set upon his enemy as an insane, ravenous and intelligent fiend? Is he not an animal to be beaten and used?

Is he not a slave?

He hears that he is breathing hard, though he has not needed to breathe in a very, very long time. As he kneels here in the water and the grass at the mercy of his Master he trembles to recall, to remember, to shake and tense in expectant pain and agony. He sobs, and as his Master moves his hands to comfort him—to _comfort _him, he is unworthy, he is a _disgrace—_he fists his hands in his Master's clothes and cries until there are no tears left in his entire body. But still the sun is shining down on him. Still the sun has not moved far over the horizon and into the darkness as it should. Time must pass differently here. A day must feel like a thousand years in his prison.

“Please, Hongjoong,” his Master requests of him. “Hongjoong, look at me. Do you trust me?”

He coughs, chokes on his own tears and nods. Of course he trusts him. As though he could do anything else, as though there is any other option in this earth that he would choose.

“Then look at me.”

He has no right to refuse.

He looks up into his Master's beautiful face. His beautiful, beautiful face and his expression is warm as the sun itself, beating down upon him. He can feel the occasional hiccup, and lets go of his Masters clothes—how _dare he _touch the robes of his betters—and turns his hands to his chest, readying them for shackle and chain. Instead his Master wraps his warm, warm arms around him and blesses him with soft kisses. Little presses of his lips and a soft cooing in his ear to give comfort. _Comfort. _As though he is worthy of such a thing.

“But you are,” his Master murmurs into his ear, as though he can hear everything inside of his head. “Hongjoong. You're so worthy of comfort and care. Please. Don't behave as though you aren't. It hurts me. You don't want to hurt me, do you?”

He shakes his head almost violently. He never wants to bring him pain or suffering of any kind. Never.

“Then please,” his Master says, kissing the side of his head though his filth is great. “Please let me comfort you. Let us comfort you, and care for you. If you want to serve me, protect me, you will do this. You _will _do this, Hongjoong.”

He can do nothing but nod. He doesn't understand. He has never served a master in this way, certainly not his betrayer or any who came before him.

“Thank you,” his Master says, sitting up a little. “Now. Can you stand? Come into the house with me. You need to be bathed.”

He can stand, and he does. He staggers on the slightly unstable ground and winces to feel another hand wrap around his arm.

“It's just Wooyoung,” his Master says. “He is a member of my family, Hongjoong. You need to show him the same respects you show me. He will not harm you. None of my family will harm you. You are safe in their presence, I swear to you.”

He nods his head, his eyes still mostly closed.

He is led to the structure on the other side of the open space, the _house. _It is unlike any home he has encountered before though it seems to have the same elements. A roof, walls, doors. The floor is made of wood, and the entire house is a bit elevated. His eyes hardly stray from that floor. He looks at the patterns on the wood, the whorls of it. Wooden floors, incredible. He hears breathing, another heartbeat aside from that of his Master. A second Master, perhaps? Perhaps he now has a household to serve. Perhaps all of them are at least half as merciful as his Master.

He can feel curious eyes on him. He keeps his head down. He does not wish to meet any eyes until he is sure of his position in the household. He does not wish to overstep, no matter what his Master says. His word is absolute, but there is no promise that the rest of his companions will be so undeservingly kind. Surely at least one of them will recognize his worth and force him back into his place.

“Wooyoung could you draw a bath, please,” his Master says. “Get Seonghwa first.”

“Mmhm,” Wooyoung the Undying replies, casually disrespectful for not answering as he should. But his Master does not punish him.

“I'm going to undress you, Hongjoong,” his Master says. He wants to fall to his knees again, wants to beg that his Master not stoop to such a lowly action, to undress a slave for something other than... Though perhaps his Master intends to use him during bathing. He has experienced that before.

So he stands with his eyes closed, his own Undying heart seizing in his chest as the remnants of his clothing and his Master's short outer robe are stripped away to expose his worthless body and its bloodied, withered condition. He is smooth with the feed, but his form will take a long time to completely recover from its torments.

“Oh my god,” his Master says, and he crouches to hide his shame, his scars. He knows they are so many. His entire body is smooth with the pulling of his hair to make him so, pleasing to the eyes and touch. The skin of his shorthairs was long ago cut off. There is a brand there instead, a whores brand placed so cruelly just above his penis, burned there when he'd passed one and twenty summers. A permanent mark of station. And since his body had been changed soon after the mutilation and before the skin could heal, none of his hair ever grew back. There is, too, a bigger brand across his chest. This pattern one of ownership, his betrayer's mark. He regrets only that he will never be able to cut that away. That the flesh will always regrow in the form it was taken in. At least his hair has kept growing. It had once been his only vanity—long and soft, maintained with oils and frequent visits to the rivers. He can feel that it is knotted and filthy, and hopes that it might be cleaned, rather than sliced away.

“Oh no, no Hongjoong it's all right, you can stand. Please stand, I'm—it's all right.” his Master's kind and merciful hands draw him up. Cup his cheeks, smooth his new and itching tears. Lead him down a wide hall to a room with... With a strange torch, a... A light, his mind provides, depending on the words and knowledge he gained from his Master while engaging in the feed. There is a large... Bathing tub, and in the room is Wooyoung the Undying, and... A companion? Another Undying.

“Hongjoong, this is Seonghwa,” his Master says. “Do you remember? He's the eldest in the house.”

He nods, making himself small as he can.

“He's going to help you get you clean. Wooyoung is going to hold your hand, all right? If you feel unsafe, or overwhelmed, just squeeze his hand. He'll call for me, but I need to attend the rest of the house for a while.”

He nods again, lets himself be pulled toward the bathing tub, into the water. Warm, it's so _warm, _and he trembles to settle into it. This is a luxury provided only to the wealthiest. His Master is a man of great station. He feels even more humiliation at how his Master had lowered himself. He is unworthy.

He takes Wooyoung the Undying's hand. Holds it as tightly as he dares as he is bathed by warm, gentle hands. Gentle, they are so _gentle. _He feels himself weeping, though he makes no sound.

“Hey,” asks Wooyoung the Undying. “Hey, are you okay? Hongjoong. Talk to me.”

He can only whisper in his mind, his throat too torn, too ruined yet for speech. He tries to direct his words specifically to Wooyoung the Undying. He does not want to worry his Master. Nor Seonghwa, also Undying. How many of them are there in this home? Had not his Master mentioned many names? Six?

_i do not deserve this _he whispers. Wooyoung the Undying holds one of his hands in both of his own. _i dare not disobey though i do not understand why my master is treating me thus i am not worthy of his mercies his kindness nor your own wooyoung the undying_

“Just Wooyoung,” he says, and he shudders to be addressed as though he is on the same level. Worthy of respect and care.

But had not his Master said that he was? Had he not been told that he was to be comforted, cared for, if he were to fulfill his role as slave and protector? Had he not agreed to do as he was bid?

_wooyoung _he whispers, daring to look no further than his mouth, which is curled into a gentle smile. _i am not worthy_

“Of course you are,” Wooyoung says, and his other hand moves to touch his hair. He flinches, ashamed, but Wooyoung does not seem to care about his filth. “Yeosang brought you here, so of course you're worthy. You don't need to be scared, Hongjoong.”

_i am not afraid _he protests, very quietly._ i know my place in this world _

“You _knew _your place,” Wooyoung says, like he's correcting him. “But Hongjoong, it's... It's been a long time, right? Since you were... Put down there?” He nods.

“The world's changed a lot since then. So don't worry about... About your _place, _so much. Just worry about how happy you are.”

He lets out a sound that would have been a bark of laughter if he could have made a proper sound. As it is he simple curls in on himself and shakes his head.

_happiness is not for my kind_

“What is your kind?” Wooyoung asks, as a rush of warm water runs down the back of his head and he jerks forward in surprise.

“Aah, my apologies,” comes a voice he does not know. Seonghwa the Undying, then. “I didn't mean to startle you.”

He shakes his head, trembles when a hand pushes back his hair to expose his face. It is the one unruined part of his body. It had been a command, a _requirement, _that nothing harm his face before the change had been made, so his scars never lasted. He knows his features are delicate and feminine. That his mouth and eyes are appealing. It frightens him to be so exposed. He can't help but gasp and recoil in fear when Wooyoung tips his head up with a gentle hand under his chin. He tries to keep his eyes down, closed. Perhaps he _is _going to be used. Perhaps his Master will want to share him with Wooyoung.

“Look at me, Hongjoong.”

Wooyoung's voice is so warm. So tender. His Master had commanded him. Although he is shaking with fear, he opens his eyes. Looks up at Wooyoung as he nearly pants for air he hasn't needed in a hundred million lifetimes. Wooyoung is golden and radiant, with hair like spring flowers. His eyes are dark and deep, his mouth plush. His smile is breathtaking. Wooyoung is the personification of Summer itself, and he is surely not deserving of the sight.

“There you are,” Wooyoung says, and his hand is so gentle but it does not allow him to look down. Holds under his jaw and smoothes a thumb across his cheek. “Oh Hongjoong, you're beautiful.”

He has been described as many things. Ugly, pretty, whoreson, tight, dirty. Small, womanly, delicious, slut. Desperate. Tasting like autumn, like death.

But never _beautiful. _That word is reserved for the truly exceptional. For the clean and wealthy and his betters. Never himself. To hear himself described as such makes pathetic tears fall from his eyes, makes his mouth open as though to protest, but no words come through. Just a horrid, dragging sound. He hates it. He wants to look away but Wooyoung will not let him. He tries to remember, to focus on the fact that Wooyoung is his Master's companion, and thus above him. That his requests and demands have weight, so he simply closes his eyes, squeezes them tightly shut.

He feels himself being pulled in to Wooyoung's body. Can taste the summer smell of him, shudders to feel his warmth so close. Wooyoung is his Master's equal and he, too, lowers himself to embrace a slave as though he is worth something other than a body to be used for sex or battle.

“You're not a slave, Hongjoong,” Wooyoung whispers in his ear. “And no one is going to use you.”

_i am meant to be used _

“You are meant to be _loved,_” Wooyoung says, fiercely. “You are meant to be loved, and cared for, and cherished. Yeosang didn't bring you out of the dark only to put you in another prison where you can be harmed. Trust us. And if you can't trust _us—_any of us—trust _him._”

Trust him.

Had not he said that he trusted his Master, when he brought him up the stairs and out of the darkness? Had he not promised that he trusted him when he was gifted with the sun overhead? But how can he trust in this way? How does one have faith that they will never be turned away, never harmed, never used? How can one believe such things when they have never known otherwise?

It is not pity he feels for himself, only confusion. Confusion at Wooyoung's words, at his behavior. At his Master's behavior, at Seonghwa the Undying's behavior. He is so confused, and intimidated, and so hopelessly _frightened. _Even moreso because they all seem to think he has no reason to be so.

_how _he asks, breath on Wooyoung's ear where he is being held, his free and shaking hand placing itself—of its own volition, it feels—on the warm cloth across Wooyoung's back, fisting up in it, holding on with desperate strength.

_how _he cries, pulling himself closer to Wooyoung with one arm. Wooyoung lets go of his other hand, and climbs into the water with him. Climbs fully clothed into the filthy water to embrace him fully, to hug him close and grace his face with soft kisses, to hold him in his lap, chest to chest like a child and rock him back and forth, back and forth. He feels more warm hands on his back as Wooyoung leans into the side of the bathing tub—letting him stay on top of his chest, weeping _again, _sweet Gods above is he so pathetic? So weak?

Yes.

Yes, he is.

He is weak, and afraid. Terrified. What does he have to hold on to? Nothing more than the words they keep speaking, nothing more than their promises that what they say is true. But what have they done to suggest that the words are _not_ true? Has his Master not brought him out into the sun, as he promised? Has he not brought him to a safe place, with his family? Has he not trusted Wooyoung and Seonghwa the Undying to tend to him?

Had Wooyoung not told him that he was worthy of care, of love, and is he not proving that now, as he holds him and murmurs reassurances with no hint of indecency in his intentions, while another set of hands washes his hair—they must belong to Seonghwa the Undying, because his Master is not here.

Does his Master not trust these men? He does. He trusts his Master, and so... He can trust them. These others. Until they prove themselves untrustworthy.

“Trust us, Hongjoong. Please. Nothing here, no one, is going to harm you. I promise.”

He is so tired.

He is so very tired, and so weak.

So he closes his eyes, exhausted, slipping back to the gentle sleep of dreams, and trusts that Wooyoung is going to hold him up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> love you!


	22. Chapter 22

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> discussion of tragic backstory!! including everything that's been mentioned previous! nothing graphic!

It's pathetic, really.

Seonghwa hasn't seen something _this _pathetic in a very long time. But Wooyoung doesn't move from where he's cradling the positively _ancient _vampire on his chest, so Seonghwa works around him. He hadn't been privy to their conversation—well. The vampire's half of it, anyway—but it had clearly upset him, and it upset Wooyoung.

“Is he all right,” Seonghwa asks softly, as he tries to work the snarls out of the vampire's white hair with his fingers and a great deal of conditioner.

“I don't know,” Wooyoung admits. “He's... He's messed up. Really bad, I think... I think something bad happened. Before he got put in there.”

“Mmm,” Seonghwa says, frowning. There. That had been a very, very strange place, wherever it was. He has a feeling that if they try to go back and find it again tomorrow, it won't be there. That place had been _beyond _magical. Probably only opened at one exact time in one exact place for one exact person meeting whatever requirements were necessary. A curse, certainly. A powerful one. A cruel one.

“How long do you think he was down there?” Wooyoung asks, looking up at him as Seonghwa pours more conditioner into—Hongjoong? Yes, Wooyoung had called him Hongjoong—Hongjoong's hair, to very gently start untangling it with a fine-tooth comb.

“With teeth like that?” Seonghwa says, shaking his head. “Who knows. A thousand years, two thousand. Our kind haven't had teeth that brutal in a long time.”

“Why?” Wooyoung asks.

“Because those kind of teeth were necessary when vampire attacks still had to look like animal attacks. Back before we figured out the magic of glamours and ways to take the blood without actually killing the human we were feeding from.” He pauses. “But he's not like us. Regardless of his age he's not... Normal.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean...” Seonghwa licks his lips and wonders how to word this. “I mean he feels like Yeosang and Yunho. He feels like an immortal. But he also feels like a vampire.”

“So you're saying he was... What, turned?”

“Probably,” Seonghwa says, huffing out a breath. “If they managed to get him just to the cusp of death, just tipping over it, and put enough vampire blood in his system he would come back as a vampire. It would've have been... Incredibly precise. The timing would need to be perfect. The likelihood of it working is... I can't even describe the odds, they're that small. Infinitesimal.”

He looks down at the small man he's bathing and feels a sick stone of pity in his stomach. “I suspect it took several attempts. And it probably wasn't a pleasant experience for him.”

“Jesus,” Wooyoung murmurs, rubbing his hands up and down the pale, scarred back. Whipping scars, Seonghwa recognizes. Burns, cuts. The brands on his front, the rips in his earlobes where earrings must have once rested. Bumps of broken ribs.

“Yes I suspect... I suspect our Hongjoong has had a very, very hard time.”

It takes hours to get Hongjoong clean. They refill the tub several times; luckily now that Hongjoong is unconscious he doesn't seem like he's going to wake up any time soon. So Seonghwa washes his hands and his face, his neck, his legs and feet. He finishes getting the knots out of his hair and rinses out the conditioner, and with Wooyoung's help he gets Hongjoong dried off and into a t-shirt and shorts. Yeosang still hasn't come back. Seonghwa suspects he's being held prisoner by the younger charges—so he just scoops Hongjoong up and carries him to the spare bedroom, with Wooyoung close behind.

“I suspect he shouldn't wake up alone,” Seonghwa says. “He might panic.”

Wooyoung nods. “You're probably right. Should we both stay?”

“I think you should put him exactly as he was in the tub and yes, I will stay with you. If he wakes up in a fit I want to be able to help you calm him.”

So Seonghwa helps Wooyoung climb into the bed, helps him arrange Hongjoong on top of his chest, head tucked under his chin, hand close to his own mouth. It's a good thing that Seonghwa stays, because Hongjoong wakes like the hounds of hell are chasing him through his dreams—kicking, screaming near silently, breathlessly, thrashing and trying to get away from them. When he can't get out of the blankets, too tangled up, he weeps like a child, curled up small and hands covering his face.

Wooyoung rubs his bruised jaw and thigh, already healing. He looks helplessly at Seonghwa, who takes a deep breath and very, very carefully lifts Hongjoong up into his lap, blankets and all. “Shh,” he soothes, his lips in Hongjoong's soft white hair. “Shh. You're safe. You're safe, Hongjoong, you're safe. Do you know where you are?”

Seonghwa considers himself lucky that he gets a shake of the head, because he can't hear Hongjoong's voice. He can only feel his heaving, frightened breaths.

“You're in Yeosang's house. Do you remember Yeosang?” It takes a moment, but Hongjoong nods. “Do you remember Wooyoung?” Another nod. “What about Seonghwa?”

_the undying_ Hongjoong's voice whispers into his mind. It's higher than Seonghwa thought it would be. Raspier. Almost sweet. He wonders if this is what Hongjoong would sound like, if his throat were not destroyed by millennia of terrified and desperate screaming.

“That's right, yes. You're with Seonghwa and Wooyoung. Yeosang is busy with the rest of the house right now, so he left you in our care, do you remember?” Hongjoong nods, and Seonghwa kisses his head. “Do you remember what you did last night?”

_bathed _he replies, sniffling, rubbing at his eyes. Seonghwa shivers to be addressed like this, in his mind. He'd known that the place was magical—he hadn't anticipated how magical Hongjoong would be, as a result. _i was bathed i fell i fell asleep_

“You did,” Seonghwa says, rubbing Hongjoong's back, cradling him over his lap, Hongjoong's side pressed up close to his chest. “How do you feel now?”

_afraid_

“Why is that?”

_dreaming _he says. _i don't want to be dreaming i must pray i am not dreaming it is too cruel_

“You're not dreaming,” Seonghwa reassures him. Hongjoong just tucks in closer, making himself small. “Hongjoong, what...” Seonghwa pauses, trying to think of a way to get context to find out what he wants to know. “Who was the king, when you were put in the earth?”

_uija _Hongjoong says, his voice disconnected and hollow. _he'd he'd just gone to china exiled after hwansanbeol and sabi fell _

Seonghwa can't help but swallow. The 660s? That's how old this poor creature is?

“When... When did you get put in that place?”

_after the battle after the battle there was so much so much blood too much couldn't tell who was who he he put me in the earth said i was dangerous can't they can't kill me i am undying where once they they might have managed it before the change they couldn't trapped drugged i i can't remember can't remember_

Hongjoong is putting his hands on his head and Seonghwa can hear the grit of his teeth. “You don't need to,” he assures, holding Hongjoong to him. “You don't need to remember. Focus on being here with us, now. You're safe.”

Hongjoong nods, very slowly, and folds in a little more tightly against Seonghwa.

“Hongjoong are you... Are you hungry?” Seonghwa asks, feeling the way he is trembling. He shakes his head, and Seonghwa holds him a little more tightly. “Hongjoong. Are you hungry? Please don't lie to me.”

Seonghwa knows he's hungry. He knows what the hunger-shakes look like, feel like. He isn't fooled for even an instant. But he can also feel the shame radiating off of Hongjoong like a wave. The humiliation, the fear.

“You don't need to go hungry, Hongjoong. We can feed you. Would you like to feed from me, until Yeosang gets back? He'll be back soon, but I can feed you now.”

_please_ Hongjoong whispers.

“Wooyoung,” Seonghwa says. “Will you get Yeosang, please?”

“Yep,” he says, getting out of the bed to do just that. He'd been watching quietly, not speaking, and he leaves the room, gently closes the door behind him.

“Come now, Hongjoong,” Seonghwa murmurs. “Sit up a little, that's it. Is this all right?” Hongjoong is resting on his chest and lap, his arms curled under Seonghwa's to hold his shoulders from behind. His thighs are spread wider than is appropriate, his back arched toward Seonghwa almost provocatively. Seonghwa swallows in something close to hateful disgust. This, in the few history books he's read on the subject, is how vampires were trained and controlled. With sex. With pain and faux compassion, false kindness—only to turn and be beaten into submission, to be used as weaponry. He wonders if Hongjoong, mouthing softly at his neck, is the prototype for these behaviors, if he was among the first to be enslaved and so brutally used. He's old enough to be so.

Hongjoong's teeth are so sharp that Seonghwa doesn't feel the bite until Hongjoong is taking blood from him, tiny little pulls in motions like sucking kisses, so many of them, with enough time between each for him to be shoved away. It's likely this was how he was fed—how his masters demanded he feed—and he simply never learned anything else. Though it is likely that on a battlefield he was allowed to do as he pleased.

Hongjoong licks at Seonghwa's neck. Heals the wound, bites again. More tender, sucking kisses.

_hold me_ Hongjoong breathes into Seonghwa's mind, sounding as though he is crying. _please hold me_

Seonghwa holds him. Slides his hands up the back of the t-shirt Hongjoong is wearing and touches his skin, scarred and clean. Hongjoong makes a sound with his throat that might be an attempt at a moan as he sucks a little harder, shivering. Hongjoong moves his body like he's accustomed to being fucked in this position and Seonghwa _hates. _

He holds Hongjoong close to him, his own eyes squeezed closed. He hadn't realized he was crying until Hongjoong licks up his face, his cheeks. He peppers Seonghwa's face with kisses. And he's so small, and so beautiful, and it _pains _Seonghwa to know—because he does know, with his touching, exactly why Hongjoong is behaving this way. He doesn't need to ask, because with the bite between them Hongjoong's mind is an open book and Seonghwa has made the mistake of peeking in.

Let that be a lesson about staring into an abyss, for the abyss stares back at him.

Beating, whoring, _whoreson, _helpless, small and terrified, dying in a brothel, a drug overdose and suffocation. Waking in fear, clawing out of a shallow grave, staggering. Chased away from home, wandering. Another brothel, a general, taking fancy. Tilting chin this way and that, hooking fingers in his lower jaw hard enough to break the skin beneath the tongue. A personal whore, a plaything. A mad physician, cutting away skin, pushing hot iron brands, so much screaming. Can't die, can't ever die. Killed so, so many times and finally come back wrong. Come back changed.

Still a whore. Still a worthless whoreson but now, now one that is starved before battle, for days and days and days, unfed, struggling against chains. On battlefields, unbeatable, Undying, a monster with no name. After conflicts, tied down for amusement, fucked to be fed. To be given the privilege of begging for blood. A battle. Bloody and ruinous. A man in white. Chains. Drugs. Taken in the day while sleeping, unable to defend himself.

The dark. The dark and the cold, screaming and screaming and screaming until the screams turn to wails and the wails turn to mewls and the mewls turn to helpless, hiccuping sobs. Alone. Alone in the dark and the cold, hungry and frightened and dying over and over again. The Sleep, the merciful Sleep that never stays long enough. Oh, to Sleep forever.

A vibration. A heartbeat, a voice. Mercy, sweet, sweet mercy could be death and nothing more. Instead, hands. Gentle hands, so gentle. Killing, killing killing killing. Starving. For days, killing.

Confusion, fear. Tender hands, tender eyes, tender voices. Family. Home. Safe.

Seonghwa stares up at the ceiling and holds Hongjoong to him, hugging him tightly, pressing his own lips together. “You're safe,” he whispers, even as Hongjoong kisses at his mouth, sucks at his lip, moans quietly against his skin. “You're safe, Hongjoong.”

Hongjoong's fingers touch his neck, and he sits up, looking down at Seonghwa with wide pupils and blood on his tongue. He looks dazed. Like he's not all here.

Then it is Yunho and _not _Yeosang in the doorway, and Hongjoong turns slowly to stare at him. Like a predator about to strike. Seonghwa grabs him by the hips and turns them over, pins Hongjoong down with his greater weight and (for now?) greater strength. Hongjoong stares up at him, tilting his head at a nearly impossible angle. He grins almost playfully, flips them over with obscene ease and drags his clawed fingers down Seonghwa's chest. He licks his own lips and the marks he leaves behind. Seonghwa is already down a lot of blood—

Yunho grabs Hongjoong by the back of the throat. Yunho is at the side of the bed behind him, one arm around Hongjoong's tiny waist, the other hand planted and gripping, fist in the hair at the back of Hongjoong's fragile neck.

“That's enough of that,” Yunho says, his voice a low and rumbling growl. He rarely sounds so cross. “If you want to be fed, you'll do as you're told.”

Aah, Seonghwa thinks, head spinning. That's why Yunho is here, and not Yeosang. Yeosang would never be able to control Hongjoong like this. Not when he's—sweet mercy, Hongjoong is nearly _feral. _It's a wonder he made it through the years while he was down in that darkness, with insanity kissing at the sides of his mind and slowly moving inwards to ruin him completely. This is probably how he managed it: by becoming an animal with no need to _think._

Hongjoong wiggles a little, but does nothing more. Just pants even though he doesn't need air, and reaches back to claw his hands into Yunho's waist. Perhaps Hongjoong _must _be controlled by a handler, human or immortal. That would make sense, given his history. He was only ever off-leash to be used or to kill. Feeding was special. If he wanted to feed, he had to behave. Whether that meant obeying the commands of others, or simply letting them do as they pleased with the promise of a reward. It's disgusting, either way.

“Seonghwa,” Yunho says. “Get over here. Eat.”

Seonghwa doesn't need telling twice. He gets behind Yunho, bites into his neck as carefully as he can, trying to make sure that Yunho's immortal body is replenishing its blood supply even as he feeds. He can feel Yunho's grip tighten around Hongjoong. It's not hard, with Hongjoong's waist being so small.

“Stay,” Yunho says, his voice hard and dark as he shoves Hongjoong to the mattress. Hongjoong, out of his mind though he is, cowers to the bedsheets, getting as small as he can be beneath Yunho's eyes. “Don't move.”

Hongjoong doesn't move.

To Seonghwa's utter horror Hongjoong does not move. He stays there with his chest pressed to his thighs and his head on the bed, his arms behind his back, wrists grabbing one another at the curve of his lower spine. Seonghwa's heart aches with the knowledge that this is a position of submission, of waiting for punishment.

“Don't hurt him,” Seonghwa breathes out. “Don't hurt him, Yunho he doesn't—”

“I won't,” Yunho says, his eyes still on Hongjoong. “Go stay with the others, please? The kids need reassuring.”

“Yes,” Seonghwa nods, slowly moving away, trying to direct all of his thoughts at Hongjoong as he backs out of the room.

_You're going to be all right, you're not in trouble, no one's going to hurt you—_

But, as though Hongjoong cannot hear him, the quiet words that have been chanting hatefully in the back of his mind since he got here are growing louder, and louder, and louder. What had been barely a whisper is turning into screams. Seonghwa isn't sure Hongjoong knows that anyone can hear it.

_unworthy unworthy whoreson for what reason did you think this would be any different you disobey you are punished if you are lucky you will die happiness is not for your kind you are meant to be used to beat and whore and serve you are unworthy look what you have done attacked him hurt him seonghwa the undying has been so kind to you speaks against the master for you but he is not the master of the house perhaps also only a slave there is no family only hierarchy and you know where your filthy being belongs you know your place you cannot hope to touch the first rung you belong in the dirt at the feet of your betters you deserve this you deserve punishment you are unworthy of anything less_

“Please,” Seonghwa is going to cry, pressing his hands to either side of his head and baring his teeth. It's horrifying, it's so horrifying. Can no one else hear it? Can no one else hear this terrible voice, these terrible words? “Please don't hurt him Yunho, he's been hurt enough—”

“I won't, Seonghwa,” Yunho promises. “Now go.”

Seonghwa goes.

Seonghwa goes and finds a place in the west side of the house to weep as quietly as he can, rocking back and forth because this is so much worse than when he'd shared blood with Mingi, or even with Wooyoung. Because their pains are relatable, imaginable, and what he's seen in Hongjoong's mind—what he has felt and heard—is too grotesque and cruel to even think about. To consider_._

A frightened man, a _child_, murdered. That same boy, killed again and again until he is forced into the change with no choice in the matter. That boy, driven to bloodlust and madness by his... By his masters_, _his _owners—_who used him as a killing machine and manipulated him into thinking it was everything he ever deserved—

Seonghwa cries for a long, long time.

Long enough that when Mingi comes to bed, his tears have dried, and his shirt is unsalvageable.


	23. Chapter 23

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> u all were so worried about yunho pfff

Yunho would be the first to admit that he had no idea what he was doing when he walked into that room to find Hongjoong... _Attacking _Seonghwa. He knew he probably hadn't handled the situation very well, but

Yunho had also thought Hongjoong would fight him harder. Would... Try to argue, try to attack or... Something. _Anything. _But instead he'd just folded over, arms behind his back. Long hair loose and the back of his neck exposed. Instead, he'd just submitted at Yunho's hard, authoritative voice, and that gives weight to Seonghwa's words.

_Please, please don't hurt him Yunho, he's been hurt enough—_

Yes. Yes, Yunho can see that clearly, now that he's actually looking.

He can see the fear and resignation and acceptance in the lines of Hongjoong's small body. This is a man accustomed to being physically harmed when he disobeys. Yeosang had described him as frightened, ancient and traumatized. All of that is true. But Yunho can see also that this is a man who was once strong. A man who has been broken.

“Sit up.”

Hongjoong shakes his head slowly back and forth twice, as though he feels like he's being tricked. Maybe it's happened before, Hongjoong being tricked by something like that; someone telling lies to get him to do what they want for no reward or worse, for punishment. Hongjoong doesn't move aside from that sway of his hair. Yunho's heart aches.

“Sit up, Hongjoong,” he repeats, trying to keep himself from crumbling to pieces with his mounting anxiety, trying to recall tones of voice that always made _him _move when he didn't necessarily want to. “_Now._”

To Yunho's surprise, Hongjoong drags himself from the bed without looking up once and drops to the hardwood with a painful noise, like his kneecaps have cracked. He hits the floor with his arms still behind his back and his white hair hiding his face. He is sitting up, even though his head is bowed so deeply that his chin must be resting against his chest. Yunho takes a deep breath. He gets down on his knees at the side of the bed and isn't surprised when Hongjoong tries to make himself even smaller, crowding the side of the bed, clearly afraid.

“Look at me.”

Another shake of Hongjoong's head. A whisper moving through his mind, barely a noise at all.

_i know my place_

“And where is that.”

_at the feet of my betters i beg forgiveness i am not worthy master please punish me for my wrongdoing_

Master. Dear sweet God above. The words come all in a tumble, all at once, and Hongjoong's chest is heaving, his torso shaking. He's crying. Yunho can hear the little intakes of breath.

_please punish this unworthy whoreson for his disobedience i am a no more than a worm beneath your boot_

“I will not,” Yunho says, trying to think of how to handle this. Resistance, he'd been prepared for. Maybe even violence. But not this. Never anything like this. He tries to consciously change his tone to something... Firm, but not insistent. “Now stand.”

Hongjoong shakes his head.

“Am I not your master?” Yunho says. Hongjoong shudders, giving a small nod. “Then you will stand when I tell you to stand.” At his words, Hongjoong nods again and struggles to get up, using the bed as leverage when his arms are still behind his back.

“Give me your hands.”

Hongjoong gives his hands. They are so small, thin and cold. Tipped in ruined, half-shredded nails hat are more like claws, and shaking with adrenaline, or fear. Perhaps he thinks Yunho is going to break his fingers. Yunho just holds them in his own, warming them, pressing them against his own chest so Hongjoong can feel his heartbeat through them.

“Do you understand why I told you to stop? Answer me, Hongjoong.”

_i attacked master seonghwa i did not return my pleasure to him i was going to attack you master_

“But do you understand _why _I told you to stop,” Yunho asks. When Hongjoong nods, he presses further, “Tell me why I told you to stop.”

_because i disobeyed_

“No,” Yunho says, trying to gentle himself further. It's difficult. He's never had to say... Anything like this to anyone. “I told you to stop because you were going to hurt Seonghwa. Or hurt me, or hurt yourself in the attempt. You aren't going to be denied food, Hongjoong. You are not going to be denied _anything. _I'm sorry I said that. I shouldn't have.”

_no no master please do not apologize i am beneath you i am not worthy_

Hongjoong seems to crumple, and the only thing keeping him from collapsing back into himself is Yunho's hands holding his. Even his hands are limp in submission when Yunho shifts to hold his lower forearms, not wanting to hurt his fingers or wrists when he hauls him back up. He lets go of Hongjoong's arms to hold him around the ribs. He holds Hongjoong to his chest. Hongjoong makes a wretched noise, even as his arms wrap around Yunho's shoulders, as his legs clamp tight around his waist. His face is turned _away _from Yunho's neck.

“Hongjoong,” Yunho says, sitting on the edge of the bed, letting Hongjoong's weight rest on his thighs. He needs to approach this differently, this isn't going to work. It's his responsibility to help Yeosang figure out what they're going to do with this ancient creature Yeosang found—Hongjoong is _their _responsibility, now.

“I understand that you are accustomed to things working in... Certain ways. Tell me, what would you be doing right now for your previous Masters, if you wanted to feed.”

_pleasure him i must please him he must be pleased with me if i cannot please him i go hungry another day_

“Another day?” Yunho asks, rubbing his hands up and down Hongjoong's back, over the t-shirt he's wearing. “How many days have you... Displeased your Masters.”

_many many many days many nights until battle then i eat i gorge i glut i become as a boar endlessly ravenously eating and he retrieves me and others call me great undying beast but alone in his house on the floors of his room he calls me pig i am not worthy of his bed master i have desecrated seonghwa the undying's bed please forgive me please_

Hongjoong's arms tighten, and he seems to try and make himself even smaller. Yunho is getting a better picture, now. Of what Hongjoong's expectations are. He suspects that's part of why no one really knows what to do with him, Yeosang especially, who had been so distressed he'd barely been able to talk to Yunho at all about what Hongjoong was, or how Yeosang had found him in the first place. Of course this is terrifying and confusing for all of them, but in Hongjoong's case—he's the one at a disadvantage, here. He's the one out of his time, and no one's yet told Hongjoong what's expected of him in this new environment.

“Hongjoong,” Yunho says, his voice as gentle as he can make it while still sounding with authority. “Let me tell you the expectations of this house, this house that I share with Yeosang.” It's as good a place to start as any, and Hongjoong nods.

“In this house, you are expected to say when you want to be fed, when you are hungry. You are expected to stop feeding when someone asks you to. You are to sleep in a bed—alone, or with others if you choose.” Yunho can feel Hongjoong cautiously relaxing in his arms. “In this house, you are expected to grow comfortable in your own time. No one will force you. You are expected to ask for things you want, and to refuse things you do not want. Do you understand this?”

Hongjoong is tensing again and shakes his head. Yunho presses his lips together.

“Let me start with a question, then. Hongjoong. Are you hungry?”

Hongjoong nods, after a long moment of hesitation.

“Would you like to feed from me?”

Another nod.

“Do you _want _to give me pleasure in return.”

_i do not know_

“It's fine that you don't know, Hongjoong. You must grow comfortable in your own time. If all you want is to feed, that's fine. If you wish to feed and be held, that too is fine. If you wish to feed and be pleasured, or be pleasured and give pleasure in return, that's fine. Think about what you want. I know it's difficult, but you can. You _can _do it, Hongjoong.” Yunho feels Hongjoong's body shudder, feels the way his cheek presses against Yunho's shoulder. His response is long in coming.

_i wish to bring you pleasure and be fed_

“Very well,” Yunho says, getting up and setting Hongjoong on his feet. “Show me how you would like to pleasure me.” It doesn't surprise Yunho that Hongjoong settles onto his knees. That after a moment of confusion at Yunho's button-and-zip, he pulls his pants down, and then his underclothes. He looks confused by those, too. Yunho stays standing as Hongjoong's fingers—his small, cool fingers—smooth up from his legs to his chest and back down, his lips pressing kisses to the neatly trimmed hair at his groin. He watches as Hongjoong mouths at the soft length of his cock, holds it from the underside, just letting it rest on his hand as he licks at his tip, kisses his foreskin.

He really does seem very different. As though this is a personality he can turn on and off, and perhaps it is. Maybe this is just another kind of performance he puts on, this show of a small, pretty whore who is eager to please. Yunho wonders if this made it more bearable to be used by the people who should have been caring for him, or worse. He decides to take a risk and, as Hongjoong takes the tip of Yunho's cock into his mouth, he touches Hongjoong's white hair. Just touches it, strokes it gently. Hongjoong closes his eyes and sighs, his hands rubbing up and down Yunho's thighs, scratching gently over his lower belly and hips, reaching up toward his chest as though all he wants to do is touch him _more, _but Yunho doesn't trust that. Doesn't trust that Hongjoong is actually, _honstly, _enjoying any of this.

Yunho is for the most part a quiet lover. Sometimes Seonghwa draws more out of him because he likes to hear it, but generally he's fairly demure in his pleasure. He doesn't realize that this is confusing Hongjoong until Hongjoong pulls away from where he's had the insides of his top teeth and tongue pressed to Yunho's skin while he swallows, swallows, swallows. Hongjoong looks up at him, kissing the base of his cock, now fully hard.

_does this not please you_

“It does,” Yunho assures.

_would other things please you further_

“Perhaps.”

_please allow me to pleasure you to the best of my ability_

“If you so desire.”

Hongjoong looks distressed, but Yunho is not going to order him around. That would be counter-productive to what he's trying to do here. So he allows Hongjoong to encourage him to sit on the edge of the bed. Doesn't protest when Hongjoong takes his cock back into his mouth and all but fucks his throat with it, coughing, spitting into his own hand, wiggling out of his own shorts. Yunho knows that Hongjoong is touching himself, realizes with some horror that spit is probably all he's accustomed to. Who knew what they were using for lubrication back in his day.

The saliva from the back of Hongjoong's throat is thick, almost foamy, and Yunho lets Hongjoong nudge him further back on the bed. Watches Hongjoong pull his shirt over his head before cough-spitting into his hand one more time, sliding it up and down Yunho's cock. Hongjoong gets up onto the bed, knees on either side of Yunho's body, and holds Yunho's length in his small hand.

Then he is sinking down, the slide easier than Yunho thought it would be, slicker. In one smooth, unstopping motion Hongjoong settles himself on Yunho's lap and makes the softest sound, rolling his hips around until he can't get any further down. Hongjoong lays back on Yunho's thighs and the bed, plants his feet slightly behind and on either side of Yunho's body. Hongjoong fucks himself and it's only for Yunho's benefit. He's not even a little hard, himself.

It's clear that Hongjoong is a professional. He moves straight up and down instead of trying to rolling his hips like a less experienced lover might. He lifts himself with his legs, not his arms, which are bent out to either side, with his hands tucked back under Yunho's thighs. His head is tipped back and to one side, mouth on the top side of Yunho's knee, where he is tonguing and kissing as he clenches down and moves in rhythm. He makes the softest, most erotic noises Yunho's heard in a long time. The slap of their skin together is lewd. Obscene. But the look on his face is almost serene, his bottom lip between his pretty, terrifying teeth.

He's beautiful. He really is beautiful. It's too bad that this is just a performance for him, that he probably isn't experiencing any proper pleasure.

Yunho is going to change that.

Yunho puts a hand on Hongjoong's stomach, slides it down to his cock which, while now not soft, still isn't hard, either. Hongjoong shudders, biting harder into his lip, his hands tensing up under Yunho's thighs.

_you do not have to touch me_

“It pleases me to do so.” Yunho says, and spits into his own hand to give Hongjoong's cock a few slick strokes. It doesn't take much. Hongjoong's rhythm stutters a little. His angle changes.

“Does that feel good?” Yunho asks, his voice soft as he sits up straight, one hand sliding under Hongjoong's shoulder. “When I touch you like this? Tell me the truth.”

_yes yes master it feels it feels so good i please please touch me more master i beg you touch me more please hold me_

So Yunho braces his hands under Hongjoong's smaller body, pulls him up, and shifts them together, to lay Hongjoong on his back on the bed. Hongjoong stares up at him, clenches in surprise, and maybe fear. Yunho bends forward and Hongjoong presses back, like a cat shying away from attention, and Yunho diverts his mouth to Hongjoong's neck, instead of his lips. He licks the skin, sucks at it, slides his hands down Hongjoong's arms, laces their hands together then braces them up and above Hongjoong's head, stretching his arms. Yunho moves down, lets go of one hand, then the other to support himself on his elbows. He leaves Hongjoong's hands free. Yunho shifts his hips and finds the angle that makes Mingi whimper every time.

Hongjoong does a good deal more than whimper. He jerks up, back tight and body stiff. His thighs shake and he closes his hands into tight fists. Yunho thrusts again. Hongjoong gives a tiny little grunt of surprise.

“Feels good?” Yunho asks, and Hongjoong nods, eyes squeezed closed. “Excellent. I want you to feel good, Hongjoong. Watching you feel good will bring me great pleasure.” Yunho pauses, a thought occurring to him. Perhaps it's not that Hongjoong _can't _speak, but that he is unconsciously _afraid _to.

“Hearing you speak will bring me more.”

_master_

It's more like a whimper than a word.

“Yunho,” Yunho says, as he gets closer, reaches one hand to support the small of Hongjoong's back while resting his weight on his other elbow. He makes sure that, as he thrusts, Hongjoong's cock is rubbing between their bellies. The point now is to overwhelm Hongjoong with pleasure, with _good _physical and emotional stimulation. “My name is Yunho, and you will use it.”

_m-master i_

“Say my name, Hongjoong.”

Hongjoong sobs, and Yunho catches the sound in his mouth as he kisses Hongjoong, deep and wet and slow. He lets his tongue move over Hongjoong's teeth. Yunho groans to feel him moan, feeling him shake, feeling his legs finally hook around the back of Yunho's waist because he can't stop himself anymore. Good. He shouldn't. He should enjoy this as much as Yunho does. Because it _does _feel good. Hongjoong feels good. Around and against and below Yunho, Hongjoong feels incredible. Yunho is going to cum—he can feel it. He wants Hongjoong to cum, too. Wants to feel him enjoy an orgasm, his first in what must be a thousand years and maybe even longer. He sucks at Hongjoong's bottom lip, licks at his sharp, terrifying teeth.

“Say my name, and cum.” It's not a request, but not an order, either. He can hear Hongjoong making proper sounds, vocalizing almost-syllables as he lays trapped beneath Yunho. _Mo, pl, ye. _

“Call my name, Hongjoong.”

“_Yunho—_”

Hongjoong nearly screams, tightening his legs, clenching around Yunho, wrapping his arms around Yunho's neck and shoulders. Hongjoong claws desperately at Yunho's hair as he shakes and jerks and sobs, really sobs, tears falling from his eyes as his body relaxes to trembles. Yunho rocks his hips forward twice, groans into Hongjoong's ear as he cums in a slow, hot pulse. Yunho gets down onto his elbows, pushing his hands under Hongjoong's body to cradle his head, to guide him into a kiss. It's much the same as earlier—deep, soft, intentional. Nothing rushed about it, nothing dominating. Hongjoong is still crying, his fists loosening to just smooth and pull frantically through Yunho's hair, touch his shoulders, his neck. He holds Yunho's jaw with great reverence, hiccups and twitches when the motion brings Yunho in closer, deeper. Hongjoong kisses all over Yunho's face, lingering at his mouth.

“Yunho,” he whispers, laughing, smiling in what must be delight at his own ability to speak. “Yunho, oh, Yunho.” His true voice is just as high and rasping as his mind-voice. But there's a timbre to it, a texture and depth that makes Yunho hum.

“Hongjoong,” he returns, and Hongjoong giggles, actually giggles—childish and bursting like bubbles in summer air. “Hongjoong, that was beautiful.”

Hongjoong's body only loosens enough from Yunho's for his grip to become more sensual—touching his shoulders and neck and chest, his legs twisted around Yunho's thighs, instead of his waist. His grip is holding their bodies together.

“Yunho,” he says. “Yunho, Yeosang, Seonghwa, Wooyoung.”

“That's right,” Yunho smiles. “That's us. You haven't met the others yet.”

“Others?”

“The children.”

“Children...” Hongjoong pauses, visibly dazed, and slides his hands down Yunho's arms. “Children?”

“Mm. Come now,” Yunho says, slowly sitting up—using his hands on Hongjoong's back to bring him with him, humming at the little whimper he gets in return. “I told you to eat.”

“Eat,” Hongjoong says, as though trying to fit his mouth around the word. “Feed.”

“Yes,” Yunho nods. “Feed. Until you're full.”

“You are...” Hongjoong pauses, screwing up his face. It's adorable. How anyone could have found Hongjoong's face something fearsome, Yunho has no idea. “Deathless. Like... Yeosang.”

“Yes. So you can eat as much as you need, do you understand?”

Hongjoong nods, slowly, and threads his fingers back into Yunho's hair with great gentleness. His bite is so sharp Yunho almost doesn't feel it. He sucks so gently, so slowly. He moves his body as though he were still fucking himself, even as Yunho is slowly going soft inside of him.

Yunho doesn't even get lightheaded. But he feels Hongjoong lick the wounds and tentatively hug him around the neck, more tightly as he must finally realize that Yunho, his arms around Hongjoong's tiny waist, is probably not going to harm him or push him away. He snuggles in, and before Yunho really knows what's happening, Hongjoong is sleeping against him, limp-necked and boneless. Yunho manages to get them under the blankets. He pulls the cloth up as best he can, and kisses Hongjoong's hair, his forehead, his cheeks and nose.

He hears the door open, and looks up at Yeosang, peeking in through the crack, and smiles a little.

“It's gonna be fine,” he whispers. Yeosang nods, blowing him a kiss before quietly closing the door behind himself. Hongjoong sleeps for a long time, but Yunho doesn't feel the need to wake him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> bc this chapter isn't from hongjoong's pov you kind of miss a lot of what's happening here, but his main thought, like, the one that inspired his behavior for this chapter, is this:  
"please do not be so cruel as to have shown me the sun and all its beauty to have shown me what affection you could give only to take it away i would rather die another thousand deaths than suffer that pain."  
just. so you all know i'm still here for fucking up hongjoong.
> 
> (what interactions are you craving, now, mm? tell me~ i require the assistance at this juncture!)


	24. Chapter 24

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there are no warnings for this chapter! this happens immediately after yeosang leaves hongjoong with seonghwa and wooyoung.

> _It is March 19th, 2023._
> 
> _The man I found in the swamp, in a cruel and magical prison, is called Hongjoong. _
> 
> _He keeps calling me Master. I fear his mind is not whole._

Yeosang goes to check on the others as soon as Wooyoung and Seonghwa seem to have control over the situation. He can practically _feel _their worry as he moves down the hall, and isn't surprised when San jumps him as soon as he walks in the door, heedless of his disgusting clothes.

“What the fuck was that,” he whispers into Yeosang's ear, squeezing him more tightly than is comfortable. Yeosang has to think about the answer. San walks him to the bed and drags him down, the two of them on their sides. Jongho climbs in behind Yeosang, wraps an arm around his waist. Yeosang feels Mingi's weight on the bed, moving the mattress.

“I found an ancient vampire in a swamp by following a thread of magic,” Yeosang sums up, and San hisses into his hair.

“That doesn't explain anything!”

“But it's what happened,” Jongho says. “You know Yeosang sees lines, and that place was... Super magical. Don't tell me you didn't feel it, San.” San grouses, mumbles into Yeosang's hair that he doesn't really care what happened, so long as Yeosang is home now, safe with them.

Yeosang chuckles quietly. He can't really explain the dreamlike feeling of surreality that wrapped around him as he walked through the swamp. He can't explain the all-over vibration of magic in the air so thick he was breathing it in. Instead, he kisses San's throat and moves to sit up.

“I'm fine,” Yeosang says. It's the truth. Being home feels much better, no longer all topsey-turvy and not really there. “I found him, we all made it home safely. So it's all right.”

“Speaking of him,” Jongho says. “What are we going to do with him?”

“Yeah,” Mingi asks, uncharacteristically serious. “What _are _we going to do with him?” Yeosang doesn't have an answer for a moment, he doesn't have any idea what they're going to do. It's all up to Wooyoung and Seonghwa, right now, as they bathe him and try to make him... Less feral, though Yeosang isn't sure how much good it's going to to. The magic thread that led him to Hongjoong is gone, but Yosang had seen hints of it, of magic like string wrapped around Hongjoong's throat, his arms, his torso and legs. They were faint, but they were there. Nevermind his behavior. Hongjoong had called him _master, _had called him _savior, _but hadn't called him by name.

“I suppose we're... Going to keep him,” Yeosang says. “He's... Even if I hadn't found him, I don't think I could let him leave. Not in the state he's in.”

“Like a wild animal?” San suggested, perhaps unkindly. Yeosang pinches his waist.

“You remember the first few weeks, don't you?”

“Yes,” San says, squirming to get away from the pinch.

“I imagine it's something like that, multiplied to... I don't even know what degree,” he admits. “He was really confused when I pulled him out—”

“Pulled him out of where,” Jongho asks.

“He was behind a wall,” Yeosang says, remembering the cold stone, the unnatural strength it took to force them open, and apart. The chains and the mask, the bit between his ferocious teeth. “He was behind a stone wall, and he was chained. Definitely magical restraints. And he's so old.”

“Is he dangerous?” Mingi asks from where he's running his hand through Jongho's hair. “I mean, is he a danger to us or to the city?”

“I don't think so,” Yeosang says. “He has better control now that he's fed. If I'd pulled him out of there without feeding him first, he would probably feed his way through New Orleans.”

“So we don't have to worry about him attacking us,” Mingi concludes with a nod.

“I'm not sure about _that,_” Yeosang says. “Though I think I can get him under control before he does any real damage. He keeps calling me _master._”

“Not in the sexy way,” Say says.

“No,” Yeosang rolls his eyes. “Not in the sexy way. In the slave kind of way.”

“He was a slave?” San winces, squeezing his arm around Yeosang's shoulder.

“I think so,” Yeosang says. “I can't know for sure. It seems like he was. But we can deal with that later—I really need a shower, could you please let me up.”

“Can I shower with you,” San asks, and Yeosang nods. He knows it will likely lead to sexual intimacy of some kind; that is how San takes comfort, shows care. That slice of normalcy will help, he thinks—Even Mingi and Jongho sitting together to wait for San and Yeosang to be done is normal.

“Yeah,” he nods. San pushes away from him, on his feet in an instant. Yeosang sits up and turns to face Jongho. He looks at him critically, his eyes dark with worry, and anger, and fear. Beneath all of that is love, and relief. He leans in and gives Yeosang a peck on the corner of his mouth.

“Don't take too long,” he says. Yeosang nods at him. Mingi, sitting cross-legged on the bed, is watching Yeosang anxiously. H's still shy about physical interactions with Yeosang, as though he feels that it's not his place to touch him, but Yeosang kisses him anyway, tenderly, the soft kisses to Mingi's bottom lip, then the top, then their mouths touching one another. He pulls away before Mingi becomes overwhelmed, pushes back his hair and smiles.

“I won't take long,” he promises. Then San is dragging him to the large bathroom, pulling at his clothes, ripping the material over Yeosang's head with impatience.

“Calm down, San,” Yeosang says, grabbing San's forearms as he reaches to unzip Yeosang's fly. “Why don't you start the water first.” San stares at him, but moves away to turn on the shower—because it takes a while to heat up. He turns back to Yeosang, who has started taking off his jeans himself, the rumples of denim and the black of his briefs halfway to the floor.

“Easy,” Yeosang says, as San pushes him back against the counter, which digs into the small of his back. “Easy, San, I'm right here.”

“Right here,” San breathes, pressing his mouth against Yeosang's, speaking against it. “Right here, right here, safe, you're safe right here at home with us—” His mouth moves down, kissing Yeosang's cheek, jaw, ear, and then his neck. He pushes their hips together hard, and Yeosang gives a little groan.

“Can I,” San asks, because Yeosang has worked to teach him, over time, that asking for things is better than demanding them. His voice is desperate, Yeosang can feel a hot little tear drop onto his neck.

“Not too much,” Yeosang says. He gasps in surprise when San lifts him up onto the counter. The shower is finally beginning to steam, and the humidity-thick air is hard to breathe. Yeosang offers his neck and San bites him, gently. It's slow, his tongue is teasing the small bite, letting it drip, licking it up, letting it drip and then biting it to make the little tears of skin wider until he's practically chewing at Yeosang's skin, taking less blood than usual but just as arousing.

“Nnnsan,” he manages, leaning back against the wall next to the mirror and and flexes his hips. His erection rubs against San's belly beneath his t-shirt. The pressure of San's weight on his thighs is enough to make Yeosang groan. San knows he likes that because Yeosang had told him, one night after a brief bout of sucking one another off, and Yeosang had cum faster than usual with San's hands splayed, pushing down on the insides of his thighs.

“Shower,” San says, pulling Yeosang off the counter and setting him down. Yeosang pants and nods, moving to step into the large shower stall. The bathroom has an actual bathtub, but it's only big enough for on person.

The water is hot, and Yeosang turns the water down a little. San steps into the shower behind him, and closes the etched glass door. He presses his chest to Yeosang's back and hugs him close. He's hard, too—probably his or Yunho's doing, yesterday—and he rocks against Yeosang, face in his neck and shoulder.

The lack of verbal communication doesn't upset Yeosang, as San rubs hands over his chest to get the blood off. He grabs for the soap and a scrubbie, pulls Yeosang out from under the water to use the soap all over his body, going so far as to kneel and wash his legs and between them, not shy about putting pressure where it feels best.

“San,” Yeosang complains. San hums, gets up, leaves one hand around Yeosang's erection and strokes up and down. The soap makes the movement along his shaft easy and slick, moreso than the water. Yeosang moves his hips into the motion, feels himself getting carried away by San's expertise—his hands are so talented he could turn stone into jade. “Aah, San—”

San turns Yeosang in his grip. Pushes his chest against the wet, warm tile and Yeosang grabs at the metal bar across the wall, over his head and meant to hang towels, shower caddies and bathing supplies. He's glad it's strong enough to hold his weight, as San pulls him back and rubs some of the soap from Yeosang's erection to his inner thighs. When his skin is slick and soapy from rim to ballsac, San pushes between Yeosang's legs, holding his thighs together with his supernatural strength. Yeosang groans, drops his head and doesn't do anything except watch his length bob between his legs as San pulls him up and back, almost lifting him with every thrust.

“Ah... Nn... Ah—” Yeosang makes a breath noise every time San's body slaps against his, every time San pulls back. It feels good, it always feels good with San, and San whispers into his ear,

“On the floor. Hands and knees, Yeosang.”

Yeosang, shaking a little, lets go of the bar and collapses back. San guides him to the floor tile. Once there Yeosang gets down and lets his face rest in his upper arms, stretched out in front of him. He crosses his knees. San thrusts between his legs in a pleasurable mockery of sex, hips smacking against Yeosang. The shower water is sliding down Yeosang's back into his hair. He turns his face toward the floor, forehead against his forearm and bicep.

San moves faster. Harder. He doesn't say anything, but this isn't about talking, this is about being together, sharing this intimacy, being safe. Yeosang reaches his free hand down between his thighs and when San pushes, Yeosang's fingertips are struck by his tip. His balls rest on his wrist and his length rubs between his forearm and belly.

“San,” he pants, wishing he could spread his legs, aching for San to b holding him in another way but he's too close, too close—

Yeosang cums, pushing his arm up and jerking back and forth. San bends him further, pushes him to the tile, and keeps thrusting until he cums with a snarl and bites Yeosang's back, because he can't quite reach his neck. He sits up, pulling Yeosang back onto his lap and kisses frantically at him, hands on his chest, rubbing over the skin. Yeosang just groans.

“You feel so good,” San whispers. His voice is fast and desperate. “I was so worried I was so scared, Yeosang—”

“Shhh,” Yeosang reaches back at an awkward angle to rub his fingers against San's scalp. “Shh, it's okay baby. It's okay. Come on, lets get cleaned up.” San nods, Yeosang can feel it, and he isn't surprised, when he gets to his feet and turns, that San is crying. Just a little, but enough to show even under the shower water. Yeosang coos, reaching to push fingers through his wet hair and squeeze his shoulders. San doesn't say anything for the rest of the shower—cleaning themselves off, washing hair. San waits patiently in the bathroom while Yeosang brushes his teeth. Yeosang blowdries their hair. They walk back out into the bedroom to see Jongho sitting against Mingi, who is carding a hand through his dark hair. Yeosang pulls on pajama bottoms, while San just drops his towel, and climbs into bed. Jongho immediately tucks himself under Yeosang's chin, giving his waist a tight squeeze.

Yeosang hums into Jongho's hair, kisses his head. Jongho doesn't say anything but then again, he doesn't have to. He's been with Yeosang the longest, and Yeosang can read him like a book. His fear has vanished, but his concern lingers on. They'll speak about it in the morning, when Yeosang has the energy to do anything other than reach for Mingi's hand, kiss his fingers, and let himself collapse into sleep. 

Yeosang has an alarm set to wake every day at nine, but the next morning it's Wooyoung who wakes him—loud and frightened, calling his name.

> _It is March 21st, 2023._
> 
> _I believe that keeping Hongjoong with us is going to be as difficult as I feared. _
> 
> _But I will not abandon him. I found him, and so I will keep him. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and you were all so worried about sansang!! be not afraid!!
> 
> you can find me on twitter @iwriteausins!


	25. Chapter 25

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we're back on proper timeline, now! this is approx 1.5 days after hongjoong falls asleep w/yunho.  
discussion of past traumas, some possibly pretty upsetting content, but nothing graphic.

When Hongjoong wakes it is his First Master, Yeosang, beside him. He can smell the sweet familiarity of his flesh and his blood, warm under his head. His Second Master, Yunho, must have left him, traded places with Yeosang while Hongjoong slept the sleep of the fed and exhausted. He did not have any nightmares. He did not dream at all. His throat aches. His eyes are slow to open. First Master Yeosang is petting his hair and he is gentle, as he has been gentle. Very unlike Second Master Yunho, though there must be a firm master and a gentle master in every house.

“Hongjoong,” First Master Yeosang says. “Are you awake?”

“Yes, First Master.” His voice scrapes out of his throat, ugly. He has been screaming for a hundred thousand millenia. It makes sense.

“Please, Hongjoong, I told you to call me Yeosang.” His voice is so patient. So kind. Hongjoong feels what is left of his heart swell and burst over and over like the tide rising in his chest.

“Forgive me. Yeosang.”

“Don't worry,” he says, humming. “You'll get the hang of it.”

It is only thanks to the feeding that Hongjoong understands this phrase, understands the language his First Master is speaking. Through his consumption of the flesh, blood and bones he has learned all that his First Master knows.

“I shall make my best effort to please you.”

First Master sighs, and bends down. There is pressure against the side of Hongjoong's head, and for a moment he worries that he might be struck, but there is only a light kiss to his hair. His clean, uncut hair. He had been... Bathed, by Wooyoung and Seonghwa, both of the Undying. Then claimed and disciplined by Second Master Yunho, the Deathless. There are differences between the Undying and the Deathless. Hongjoong is the only creature he knows that descends of both clans. He is an abomination, doomed to need the flesh and blood, cursed to live on while watching the great savage maw of eternity swallow the world without ever passing through its teeth himself. Trapped outside of the place where all others go, in their time.

The thought, as it always has, makes him wish to curl into himself and disappear, to cry like a little child despite the beating it will earn him. To cry is a weakness but in his past life, one of his Betrayer's many companions would attempt to bring him comfort, whether between their legs or in their arms.

Hongjoong only ever found true safety with his Betrayer's wives and eunuchs; they were of his class, and did not find it frightening that he could not be killed, or disgusted that he needed the flesh and blood to live. Most of them found him pitiful. They fed him their blood, encouraged single mouthfuls from many bodies, as he did on a battlefield. But they were not dying and so their blood was sweet and warm. Many times it was they who made him feel wanted in the moments between battles and beatings and use. Whores united by station and circumstance, with only one another to reach out for, to hold on to.

What is Hongjoong holding on to, now? Where are the grips that will hold beneath his weak and shaking hands?

“Hongjoong?”

Hongjoong realizes that he is making noise, real, physical sounds. His throat feels as though it has been clawed apart, but that does not stop the painful sobs coming from it. Hongjoong is embarrassed. Hongjoong is _humiliated. _He recalls that Second Master had told him it is permissible to express his needs, his wants, and he tries to focus on that. Tries to speak words though it hurts, and he is tired.

“I,” he gets out, sitting up, getting onto his knees and bending forward, hands planted on the soft, soft material of the bedclothes. Too soft for his kind.

“I, I—” Hongjoong is unsure if he desires for his First Master to stay, or for him to leave. He wishes to scream, to howl and weep. He is afraid, he is confused. He is comforted by his First Master's presence but that is _selfish, _he has others to care for, and Hongjoong—

“Please leave me,” he says, his words painful as they rake though his throat. “Please leave me, I cannot—”

He cannot bear to show his First Master this pathetic behavior, cannot bear to be seen in his disgrace. He is disgusting, a grown abomination but still grown, he should have more control over himself, this is not quiet crying in the beds of his Betrayer's wives—

“Do you really want me to leave?”

His First Master, his gentle First Master Yeosang the Deathless, who pulled him from the dark pit, has already seen Hongjoong at his worst. Has seen him at his weakest, his most unworthy, his most degraded and revolting and still—

“_No,_” Hongjoong manages to say, before all other sounds are forced out in favor of something that feels like screaming, but he cannot hear it. All he can hear is the sound of being tortured, being unwanted, being _hurt. _All he can feel is—is being cuffed across the head for stealing food, being slapped for crying, cut for fighting. It feels like all pains he has ever known are raising themselves up to tear him to pieces and he cannot hear himself but he knows it must be terrible. It must be the wails of the dead, those he once killed out of need to eat rather than mercy—a hundred thousand souls cursing him into eternity, he is going to _live forever _like this, as this_ monster—_

_Aah, Hongjoong. Don't think of it like that, you'll go mad._

_What else waits in the darkness, then, what is there besides this—this crawling, writhing, loathsome—_

_Try to hush your mind, Hongjoong. Think of it as... Being on an adventure. You accumulate all this knowledge, all these skills, and eventually, you'll be able to put those skills to use, to help others. _

_Performing charity is going to stop this madness. Is that what you believe._

_I think you need a purpose, and you don't need to be afraid of that. _

_You believe me to be an object, then. A tool, no more than a—_

_You are still just as much of a person as you ever were. You just have to be brave enough—_

_I am not brave._

_No, you are not. But you will be, with time. You will be all things with time. You have an eternity._

_No. No, there must be a way. Tell me there is a way to undo this life, I don't want this, I don't—_

Hongjoong had not wanted to be an immortal. Had woken up after his murder cold and alone and terrified, breathing in dirt from the bottom of the shallow ditch he had been thrown into. He had been killed by a patron of the brothel, and then...

The man had been there. His expression had been so kind and pitying, and Hongjoong had not known what to do but to go home but the man had not let him, at first. Had tried to stop Hongjoong, and had been there to hide him when Hongjoong was chased away from the only home he had ever known for being a monster—Deathless. Cursed.

Hongjoong had precious few years with that man, who comforted him as best he could, when Hongjoong was cracking into pieces, and then... He had walked away from Hongjoong, showed Hongjoong his back without so much as a reassurance and Hongjoong... Did what he knew _how _to do. There were always men with coin. There always men with wives too sickly or unwilling or too ugly or any number of justifications for their disloyalty. And Hongjoong had once thought that was the worst of humanity, but then he had been bought by a man with too much money and too much violence in him, and Hongjoong learned that he had been so very, very wrong.

He tries not to think of that, now. Not to think of how ugly and hurtful and torturous it had all been; the mad man with his machines and his weapons of pain, who killed Hongjoong over and over and _over _just because he knew he could—the right hand man of the Betrayer, who had purchased him from the brothel in the first place and then... Given him over to the sadistic creature calling itself a man.

_Make me a weapon of him, _he had said, and... The man with his machines and his weapons of pain and the demons on his shoulders had complied, eagerly. Hongjoong cannot remember any of their names now. Barely their faces, only the feelings in his chest and raking over his skin, remnants of wicked memories that will not leave. Or perhaps they cannot. Perhaps they are all Hongjoong is, now. Memories of pain, blood, killing, torture, desperation and the deep cavity in the center of it all where Hongjoong's simple soul had once rested. He had always been a simple boy. Simple wants, simple needs. Natural agility and athleticism, good instincts, all of that became sharper as he was honed into a weapon and used like one, but...

Hongjoong has always been a simple boy. What child—even of one and twenty summers—does not simply wish for a place to be safe, for a person to be safe with? Any person. Hongjoong has spent so long being a tool—for pleasure, for murder, for mayhem and personal vengeance, for threatening and using. He is not sure he knows how to simply _be. _

It strikes him now that this new world terrifies him beyond measure, and even with his kind and compassionate First Master and his family, Hongjoong cannot imagine ever finding a place where he fits in it. It is useless for a sinking boat to be mended when it is already in the water.

But Hongjoong is not an object.

For a moment, though his physical form is curling in more tightly, screaming more loudly, howling like a chased and dying animal, this one quiet thought pierces all others like a spear of light through his mind.

Hongjoong is not an _object. _

_You are still just as much of a person as you ever were, _the man had said. He had pushed back Hongjoong's hair, cupped his face in his hands, and kissed Hongjoong's forehead. He had pulled Hongjoong into his arms as though he were a little child and held him, rocked him, much as his precious, precious First Master is now. Hongjoong has a blanket curled in his fists and pressed to his face in attempt to muffle himself, but his First Master Yeosang has yanked him in and is holding him to his chest and neck. He is rocking them back and forth as a mother might a whimpering child, murmuring soft nothings into Hongjoong's hair. Much as he once had with the wives in his Betrayer's house, Hongjoong feels very safe at this moment. Safe enough that all this horrible poison can come up out of him, bubbling and spilling and noxious, from where it has been killing him slowly for years and years and years and _years. _

Hongjoong is not an object.

He is not a man, but he is not a _thing. _He does not think his First Master would ever hold an object so tenderly. He does not think his First Master would kiss and coddle and comfort a piece of metalwork the way he is kissing and coddling and comforting Hongjoong right now. Hongjoong can feel, distantly, hands rubbing up and down his back. He can feel blankets pulled tightly around himself, can feel that he is rested between his First Master's legs with his head on his chest. Listening to his heartbeat.

For a while Hongjoong pretends that it is his own heartbeat. That it echoes through him as much as it echoes through his First Master. It calms his hysteria. As Hongjoong is lowered from the frantic state of panic and fear, he is aware that he is alone in a bed with his First Master, who is humming softly, audible now that Hongjoong is no longer screaming. He feels that the sun is near to rising, and does not feel the need to sleep. This, too, is a gift from his First Master. The sun. The sun, and all the good things she brings.

Hongjoong can, if he wishes, feel her again. Feel her on his skin and warming him to his core, instead of reaching out to touch her light and being burned. It is much like how he feels right now. He knows that the sun will not harm him. He knows that his First Master will not harm him. But he is still afraid on the inside, where he little more than a frightened child of one and twenty summers waking up in a shallow grave, alone and cold and still covered in blood that is his own and seed that is not. Hongjoong thinks that he is going to be afraid for a very long time.

_You just have to be brave enough—_

_I am not brave._

_No, you are not. But you will be, with time. You will be all things with time._

“Yeosang,” Hongjoong says, and his voice is weak, shredded further. It hurts to speak but he must speak.

“Hongjoong?” First Master Yeosang asks. His voice is warm with worry and Hongjoong swallows the hard lump on his tongue.

“I... Want to see the sun.”

“Lets go outside then, huh? Can you get up?”

'Can you get up?' Not, 'get up,' not, 'then go.' Hongjoong feels like he is made of rotted wood, slippery and weak, but he manages to get up somehow. He sits on the bed and First Master Yeosang pushes back his hair, kisses his forehead. Kisses it again, somehow with even more tenderness.

“Come on, Hongjoong,” he says, and gently eases Hongjoong to his feet with no force. Only support. He is not there to drag him, he is only there to make sure Hongjoong does not fall.

“Lets go watch the sun come up?” First Master Yeosang's tone turns the words into a question rather than a statement or a demand and leaves Hongjoong at a loss, for a moment, on how to respond. He finally settles on nodding, half-hobbling after First Master Yeosang as he walks them out towards the back deck while Hongjoong is still trying to stay wrapped in the blanket. It is hot here, but Hongjoong likes the comfort of the cloth. It is very soft and heavy, hand-woven. It feels good.

First Master Yeosang settles them into the swinging chair. It gives little creaks as he uses his legs to push them back and forth while Hongjoong has curled his entire body up onto the bench. Hongjoong watches as the sky through the trees begins to lighten, orange and gold piercing through all the beautiful green. There is fog on the water out in the swamp, and it glows even as it fades. It is effervescent, like nature laughing, and it is beautiful.

“I am sorry, Yeosang,” Hongjoong says, staring at the light. “That I am afraid. That I will be afraid. Please, do not—” he chokes, swallowing very hard. It's difficult to speak. He can feel that he is crying and he is unsure if it is just the blinding sunbeams piercing through the trees into his eyes, or if it is his own withered and desecrated soul trying to rekindle itself from that light.

“I will try to be brave.”

“I'll be here,” First Master Yeosang says, smiling at him. The sun warms his skin, shines through the side of his eye to show the warm, beautiful brown of it. “Even when you don't feel like you _can _try, Hongjoong, I'll be here. I'm not going anywhere. I promise.”

“I will try,” Hongjoong repeats, and First Master Yeosang's eyes become very tender.

“I will support you,” he says, and Hongjoong nods, tucking himself back into First Master Yeosang's side and stares at the sun through the trees until he falls asleep, too physically and emotionally exhausted to stay awake any longer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yeah, i know the chapter count changed again, i'm sorry, this is who i am as a person, there's always one more thing  
(it's probably still not accurate.)


	26. Chapter 26

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> posting this VERY SHORT INTERLUDE in the very short time i have between yardwork jobs  
i'm so tired

Mingi jerks awake to the sound of horrible, animal screaming. He pants for air in panic but feels Seonghwa beside him, holding his hand. Yunho came in to check on them a second time a while ago, but Seonghwa had been asleep, and Mingi loathe to wake him when he'd been so obviously distressed by whatever had happened between him and Yunho and Hongjoong.

Mingi glances over at Seonghwa, laid out in the bed he so rarely uses, and feels his heart squeeze.

“Seonghwa?” he asks, and Seonghwa shakes his head.

“There are some things you are better off not knowing,” Seonghwa says, and his voice is ragged. Not unlike Hongjoong's, now, as he wails like a wounded animal. “There are some things no one on this goodly earth should know.”

“Seonghwa.” Mingi and Seonghwa usually have a... Somewhat antagonistic relationship. Like siblings? Rivals? It's difficult to explain, and Mingi isn't good at that kind of thing anyway. Explaining. He's much better at showing, at doing. Seonghwa is the one who explains things. But that's because Seonghwa _knows. _When he shares blood with another, he _learns. _He's not like Mingi, whose senses go beyond extraordinary and into preternatural, too strong, occasionally drowning him.

So Seonghwa _knows _what's happened to Hongjoong. That's why Mingi found him here covered in his own blood yesterday, and why he hasn't moved from the bed since then, despite Yunho coming in yesterday morning to make him feed—which he'd only done under duress, and he'd not taken nearly enough to make up for his loss. Mingi managed to get him to sit up to wipe him off and change his shirt, but that's about it.

“Tell me,” Mingi says, because he wants Seonghwa to share this burden, because it's hurting him, and because listening to Hongjoong howl like a wild beast is making Mingi's skin crawl in a horrible combination of fear, pity, and loathing. Not loathing _for _Hongjoong—even knowing nothing, Mingi can see—_anyone _could see—that Hongjoong is traumatized, terribly. It's probably going to be... A somewhat normal occurrence. Waking up to the sound of him screaming. And once Mingi knows what he can do to help, he'll be all right with that. Even if all he can do is stay out of the way for a while, or hold Hongjoong down if he gets violent, he'll do it. But for now he can't do anything and that's worse.

“No,” Seonghwa says, staring up at the ceiling. The lines of red from his eyes to his hairline look like old wounds re-opened as another streak of blood slides down his face.

“Seonghwa—”

“_No._”

“Please?” Mingi doesn't like to argue with Seonghwa. Seonghwa is older, has more life experience, has been around longer than Mingi by several lifetimes but still. “Please?” Mingi wiggles in closer and he watches Seonghwa grit his teeth, hears him swallow.

“Please.” Seonghwa stares up at him, and Mingi is very cautious as he bends down, weight on one elbow, his free hand on Seonghwa's chest as he draws nearer to his oldest companion for a kiss. “Let me help you? You don't have to tell me, just—please—”

For a moment Seonghwa is made of stone: unmoving, still. Then he is hugging Mingi to him, practically crushing him, and they hold on to on another there in the dark of the bedroom, the two of them alone while Yunho likely comforts their youngers. That's all right. Mingi and Seonghwa can comfort one another.

Mingi has seen Seonghwa cry once or twice. He sometimes takes Mingi feeding in the city, holds his hand while they choose targets and Mingi can practice glamour under Seonghwa's watchful eye. Some of those targets had Seonghwa in tears at the first bite, but never afterward. Seonghwa shrugs things off remarkably easily, or maybe it isn't remarkable. He is old, after all. Maybe human pain will eventually became a thing of the past for creatures like them. Mingi doesn't know. He's too young to know.

“There is only so much agony a person should bear,” Seonghwa says. “There is a finite amount of pain—for one being to have _suffered _so badly—”

“Tell me the story,” Mingi says. He hugs Seonghwa, kisses his cheeks and his forehead. “Please, tell me.”

So Seonghwa tells him a story of a boy, a simple boy, who is murdered, and wakes up again. A boy who is left to his own devices. Bought and tortured and changed, then used. Used until his power became too great. Then he was locked away for a thousand lifetimes until a benevolent man brought him up out of the dark, but he was still so afraid. Maybe he would always be afraid.

Mingi listens to the story, parses the details. He can fill in the blanks for most of what Seonghwa doesn't tell him directly.

“It is too cruel,” Seonghwa says, where he is leaning against Mingi now. Mingi rubs one hand over Seonghwa's back, the other holding Seonghwa's. “He was barely older than you were.”

“He looks young,” Mingi says.

“Twenty-one.”

“Christ.” Mingi takes a few deep breaths. “What can I do for you, Seonghwa?” For a long while Seonghwa doesn't say anything. Just sits with his head on Mingi's shoulder, breathing.

“Share something happy with me,” Seonghwa says, and Mingi nods, tipping his head to give Seonghwa access to his neck. He thinks of a few days ago, when he and San and Wooyoung were out in the swamp under the moon and saw schools of tiny glowing fish swimming in the beams of moonlight cutting through the trees. He thinks of Jongho kissing his cheek and smiling at him, warm and happy as they sunbathed out near the more open pond and listened to the birds and bugs. Mingi thinks of San and Wooyoung arguing over the best way to make coffee for Yeosang, even as Yeosang rolled his eyes and quietly started the coffee machine behind them. Mingi thinks of the orange salamanders he saw hiding in the leaf litter near the porch. He thinks of the big alligator that laid a clutch of eggs not too far from here—of how he'd roped off the land in caution tape to keep from accidentally stepping in it, and little fairy toadstools, and the fairies that sit on them. He thinks of his days at the beach in California, where he wants to go someday, with Seonghwa and the others. He thinks of watching Seonghwa and Yunho kiss, lazy in their bed as they wait for him to come back, even though he complains about them being intimate because they know he doesn't mean it. He shares these good things with Seonghwa, these good memories, hoping to crowd away some of the more devastating thoughts crushing him.

Seonghwa's bite is gentle and perfect. Mingi bites his own lip and shivers. Seonghwa kisses him, bloody-mouthed, and Mingi bites his tongue. Seonghwa does the same. They feed from one another in this quietly intimate way, and when they part their tongues have healed, and they're simply licking the remnants of one another from their teeth.

“Come on,” Seonghwa says. “I bet those eggs will be hatching soon. Show me where the nest is?”

“Yeah,” Mingi grins, getting up after Seonghwa and holding his hand, leading him outside. Mingi waves at San, who cocks his head and waves back.

“When are you coming back?” he calls.

“In an hour,” Mingi says.

“Maybe two.” Seonghwa corrects.

Mingi cocks an eyebrow at his older companion, and Seonghwa squeezes Mingi's hand. Together the two of them walk out into the green and yellow and sound of the swamp, both to find an alligator's nest, and also to enjoy one another's company, doing nothing more than existing together in the fractured springtime sun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> mom i love them


	27. Chapter 27

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SHOULD i be updating this after only reading this over once very quickly?  
no.   
no, probably not.

Jongho decides that he is going to meet, and talk to, Hongjoong. That's the end of it. He's sick of all this wishy-washy 'you'll meet him eventually' nonsense, and the fact that Yeosang and Yunho sequester Hongjoong like he's some kind of dangerous animal. It's been _two weeks. _Enough, as they say, is enough.

So.

Like a good teenager, Jongho waits until Yunho and Yeosang are otherwise occupied with whatever disaster Wooyoung, San and Mingi have gotten themselves into, and sneaks upstairs to the attic room they have given to Hongjoong, who needs to be away from most of the noise of the house. He stops at the door, takes a deep breath, and knocks.

The door opens, and there is the source of all that worry, all that fear. There is Hongjoong, small and nude and skinny, white-haired and light-eyed and staring in confusion, and then anxiety. He doesn't speak, though. He doesn't move. Just sits there like a startled rabbit as Jongho tries to think of what to say.

“I'm Jongho,” he settles on. Hongjoong stares at him a moment longer before he says, his voice horribly rough,

“One of the Children.”

“Yeah,” Jongho nods. “Is—can I talk to you? Can I come in?”

“You need not ask permission for entry to my chambers,” Hongjoong says. “They are yours to come and go as you please, young master Jongho.”

“Just Jongho,” he says, feeling awkward. The room is bare, which doesn't surprise him—it's not like they've been out to buy Hongjoong any furniture or anything. He has't left this room aside from to go out into the swamp and he might not know what to _do _with any modern furniture. The room has light grey walls, but nothing on them. There's just what looks like a futon mattress on a platform made of... Probably pallets, on the dark hardwood floor. There is a small shelf beside the head of the bed, and a collection of rocks along the windowsill. Maybe that's what Hongjoong's doing when he goes out into the swamp in the early morning hours. Maybe it's to collect rocks.

“I just wanted to introduce myself. I know you're probably overwhelmed, and everything, but you've been up here for almost two weeks and I thought... I thought it was time I said hello.”

“I appreciate your consideration, though it is not necessary.”

Hongjoong is on his knees, sitting near the... The _bed. _He looks... Expectant? Like he's waiting for something.

“Why are you looking at me like that,” Jongho asks. Hongjoong looks at him oddly. “Like you're waiting for me to ask to sleep with you or something.”

“I am.”

Jongho almost falls over. Almost. Well. There's that honesty Yeosang spoke of.

“I don't want to sleep with you,” he says. “Not that—I mean I'm sure you're, you're very nice, but I don't—I mean I don't sleep with _anyone, _so uh, that's—I just wanted to meet you, that's all.”

“Ah.”

This is awkward. Jongho _almost _regrets coming up here.

“Well, I guess I'll leave you alone then—”

“You are very young, are you not, young master? Both physically and... In the years of your second life?” Hongjoong's words are small and anxious. Jongho nods, because he is the youngest here, the youngest by far, even from Yeosang.

“Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, I am.” Hongjoong nods, too, and looks away, toward the window. “Are you okay?”

“Yes, young master,” Hongjoong replies. There's something... Wrong with his voice. It's not... It just sounds weird. “Yes, I am well. Thank you for your concern.”

Well, that is the biggest load of shit Jongho has _ever _heard in his life. Which is saying something, because Mingi tells ridiculous stories all the time that are always lies, it's his favorite hobby or something, trying to come up with something _just _ridiculous enough that someone is dumb enough to believe him.

“You don't... Sound well?” Jongho says, and Hongjoong kind of... Freezes up. He turns to white marble, like a statue. “Hongjoong?”

“Ah,” Hongjoong says. “You are just as perceptive as First Master Yeosang has told me you are.”

Jongho doesn't think a person has to be particularly perceptive to realize that Hongjoong is Not Okay but maybe his standards are just low. He's ancient, after all, maybe emotional intelligence wasn't a thing where and when he was from.

“Do you... Want to talk about it?” Jongho asks, trying not to be _bossy, _because he's pretty sure Hongjoong will just do what he tells him, no matter what. Which is gross and weird and worrisome. “About whatever's bothering you, I mean?”

“I appreciate your offer, Young Master,” Hongjoong says. “But it is not necessary.”

“That's not what I asked,” Jongho points out, before he can stop himself. “I asked if you wanted to talk about it. Do you?”

“I,” Hongjoong pauses, purses his lips like he is thinking _very hard. _Jongho wonders if it's really that hard to think about before remembering that... Yeah, it probably is. Given what he's managed to squeeze out of Mingi by guilt tripping him, or denying him scalp scritches until Jongho gets what he wants, he knows Hongjoong was a slave for a long period of his life so maybe it _is _hard for him to be able to directly ask for something.

“I'm sorry,” Jongho says. “That wasn't fair of me. I just—you seem upset. I want to help you be... Not upset. But I don't usually, I mean, you know, touch people, like the way you—I'm not sexually active, so I can't help you like that, if that's what you need. But I can talk to you. Listen to you.”

Hongjoong almost seems to shrink and flinch.

“Hongjoong?”

“May I lay down, Young Master,” he asks, very quickly, and Jongho is so startled that he nods before he can say something like, '_you don't need to ask my permission for that._' Maybe Hongjoong needs permission.

“Of course,” Jongho nods. He watches Hongjoong slink beneath the blanket on the mattress like a child going to bed after doing something wrong. “I can leave, if—”

“No!” Hongjoong says, his outburst sudden and a little louder than his voice has been, and he looks appalled at himself, putting his fingers over his mouth. He speaks again. “No, I... I do not wish to.. Be alone, any longer, I... Find it...”

“You don't like being alone?” Jongho asks, and Hongjoong slowly shakes his head. “Do you want me to come and sit with you? I can just sit on the bed.”

“...yes, if... If you do not have other arrangements or obligations, it... I would like that.”

Hongjoong says the word 'like' the way some people say 'wish for'—in that terrible way that makes everything sound like a pipe dream. Jongho goes to sit on the mattress, puts his back to the wall and stretches his legs out in front of himself. Hongjoong looks torn between curiosity and fear, so Jongho says,

“You can touch me if you want? I mean—Mingi likes it when I play with his hair? So you can put your head here, and I can play with your hair, too?” He pats his thigh. Hongjoong moves like a suspicious cat—but he moves, and that's the important part. His chest lines up against Jongho's leg and his head rests on the Jongho's thigh, not quite close enough.

“Come a little further—I can't reach, I'm too short—that's good, yeah.” Jongho slides his fingers through Hongjoong's long white hair, and isn't surprised that he tenses up and flinches. He can feel Hongjoong's face contorting a little against his thigh, and fights to remain relaxed as he finger-combs and strokes and smooths until Hongjoong has relaxed. He doesn't pretend to breathe, Jongho notices. Maybe he's old enough that the desire to express something close to humanity is too distant.

“Feels okay?” Jongho asks, and Hongjoong nods, his arm bent over Jongho's leg so his fingers are near his mouth. Jongho can't see, but he can hear that Hongjoong is... Mouthing at his fingers? It sounds a little like a baby sucking on a pacifier.

Whatever.

Jongho isn't accustomed to this prolonged silence, and he starts talking because he doesn't like things being this quiet.

“Yeosang found me, too,” he says, not knowing where to start or what to talk about, but they have this in common so it's a good place to start. “I killed him the first time I saw him. I was so scared... I mean, I thought I killed him for real.” Hongjoong makes a sound that _could _be interpreted as a laugh.

“I have killed First Master Yeosang _many _times.”

“Well I mean, so have I, since then,” Jongho huffs, smiling. “He's a good person. He found me, he found San... We came here so he could find you, I'm pretty sure.”

“First Master Yeosang is... A pillar of all his kind could be,” Hongjoong says.

“His kind?” Jongho asks.

“The Deathless,” Hongjoong says, speaking slowly, around his hand. “The Deathless are... Eternal. All that is good and wicked, all knowledge, all kindness and evils are theirs to experience over the course of their unending existences.”

“Do you know a lot about them? The Deathless?”

“I was Deathless,” Hongjoong says. “Once. Now, I am... Undying, and Deathless. The two are not the same, Young Master Jongho.”

“How?”

“You are Undying,” Hongjoong says. “You survive on the magic inside the blood and flesh. There are ways to kill you, to kill me, that are specific to our bloodlines. There are... Very few ways to kill the Deathless. Most of them surely forgotten by this time. They were barely known in my time, when they were less apt to hide what they were, rather than simply remove themselves from the world to live in solitude.”

The knowledge that Yeosang could in fact be killed makes all of Jongho's body stiffen.

“You can kill immortals?” he asks, his voice breathless.

“Not any longer,” Hongjoong says. “If there was a secret to that act, it is long gone. Even the buildings housing the papers it would have been written on have rotted away.”

“Huh.” Jongho takes a deep breath and changes the subject. “So what did you do? Before?” Hongjoong makes a noise that could be a laugh.

“I served my masters in any way required of me.”

“Like...” Jongho hesitates and then asks anyway. “In the sexy way, or the not sexy way.”

“In all ways,” Hongjoong says. “When you own a dog, do you not expect it to obey you? Perform what tricks you have taught, behave as it ought when you punish it?” His voice isn't bitter, but it is... Flat. Hongjoong's voice isn't very dynamic anyway, but Jongho thinks that might be because of circumstance. Surely there was a time in Hongjoong's life when he was young and animated and bright. All of them were like that, once.

“I've never owned dogs,” Jongho says. “And even if I did, I don't think... I could expect a person to behave that way just because I told them to.”

“Aah,” Hongjoong says. “And that is what makes you a better person than perhaps most. Young Master Jongho. Because the thought of using the power you wield in that way has not yet permeated your mind and intentions.” He pauses. “First Master Yeosang did say that you are a... Good man.”

“He's talked to you about me?”

“First Master Yeosang and Second Master Yunho have spoken to me about all of you,” Hongjoong admits. “They were speaking of perhaps introducing you, one at a time. I suppose you have beaten them to the chance, Young Master Jongho.”

“Just Jongho,” Jongho mumbles, blushing. “I was just curious. I figured it had been long enough. I wanted to meet you.”

“That is a fair thing. I have desired to meet you, as well.” Hongjoong says, sitting up slowly. Jongho's fingers fall from his long hair. He turns to face Jongho and his mouth and thumb are a bit bloody—he must have been chewing at his thumb, that was the sound Jongho heard.

“But I must ask that you leave me, Young Master. I am... You are in danger now, worse danger the longer you stay. I have not yet fed this day and my hunger can, and will, kill you.”

Jongho blinks in confusion, but Hongjoong looks distressed and anxious. Jongho wants to ask what he means but if he's learned anything by associating with people much older than him, it's that ninety-five percent of the time, questions can wait until later.

“All right,” Jongho says, getting up. Hongjoong looks after him from where he kneels on the bed, the sheets draped around his nude body, and he... His expression is so despondent, it's _pathetic, _and Jongho can't stand it. He can't stand that look of misery on anyone, especially not on someone who is now a part of his family. So he bends down and presses a kiss to Hongjoong's cheek.

“I'll see you later, okay? Do you want me to send Yeosang or Yunho up?”

Hongjoong is cupping his own cheek, his eyes wide as he nods, mute.

“Okay. I will. I'll see you later, Hongjoong,” Jongho says, with a wave as he heads back through the door. He closes it behind himself, and notices that hanging above him is a talisman, something very, very magical. He can feel it. It probably keeps Hongjoong in that room, or at least keeps him in it when he's not in a fit state to leave it. Jongho understands why it's there, but he hates it anyway. It's terrible—it's miserable. They should be working harder to get Hongjoong out of a mental place where a talisman is _necessary. _

Jongho is at the bottom of the staircase when Yunho meets him. His eyes narrow, then look up past Jongho at the door to Hongjoong's room.

“How is he,” he asks, a small smile on his handsome mouth.

“Hungry,” Jongho answers honestly.

“I'll tend to him. Thank you.”

Jongho nods, and watches Yunho head up the stairs. He purses his lips and leaves the stairwell, wanting to go find the others—to talk to them about what they're going to do. Yunho and Yeosang can't keep Hongjoong in that room forever. They need to work together to help him. The isolation can't be good for him, and the anxiety it's causing everyone else is certainly not good.

He finds Wooyoung and San in the front parlor. He drops onto the couch between them and crosses his arms. “We need to help Hongjoong,” he says, and they both look at him, blinking almost comically. “He needs clothes. And a haircut. And... And, I don't know, sustained contact that isn't sexual or abusive _or _sexually abusive so he can stop looking confused when I tell him I don't intend to fuck him.”

“...Well,” San says after a moment of bewildered silence, cocking his head. “What size clothes do you think he wears?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i regret nothing!!
> 
> you can find me on the bird app @iwriteausins   
it's a priv/personal though!!


	28. Chapter 28

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sex in this one, but  
i mean yeah there's definitely sex in this one

San takes a deep, unnecessary breath before he walks into the front parlor. It had been decided—after Jongho snuck up into Hongjoon's room without telling anyone, the little _brat—_that Hongjoong needed to spend more time outside of the attic room, and so this little... Mission is going to take place down here, out front. Yeosang is leading Hongjoong downstairs _right now, _and San has set up this little rolling wardrobe full of the clothes he and Wooyoung purchased at a thrift store after talking to Jongho a few days ago (and Yeosang after that) about what they could _get _Hongjoong to wear, considering his history. Soft fabrics, they'd decided. No denim. Nothing with complicated fasteners. Bigger clothes and bolts of cloth he could rip apart into more suitable clothing, if he wanted. There are some very soft sheets hanging up too, because sheets are _just cloth, _San had argued, so why _couldn't _Hongjoong make clothes out of them? Didn't that nun make clothes out of drapes in that musical or whatever?

So.

Everything is ready, Hongjoong is coming down, and San is _vibrating _with nerves, because he's excited and anxious, because he's basically the only one who hasn't at least seen Hongjoong up close and—

Oh.

_Oh, _he's beautiful.

San's hand touches his own throat as Yeosang leads Hongjoong into the parlor, holding his hand, his very small hand. He's wrapped in a blanket, and his hair is silver-white, his eyes light brown. His lips are red with feeding and while he's not really _that _much smaller than Yeosang, he certainly looks like he is, hiding behind him like that.

“Hongjoong, this is San,” Yeosang says, shifting to give Hongjoong a clear view. San is glad he's only wearing a basketball jersey and briefs—given that Hongjoong is nude under that blanket, and Yeosang is fully dressed, he might feel less intimidated, since San isn't covered from head to toe. No, San is showing a lot of skin, and to his satisfaction and relief, Hongjoong looks immediately less afraid.

Maybe it's just one hooker recognizing another, who knows.

“Hi~” San twinkles in his direction, waving. “I have clothes for you! If you want them, I mean, if they're not uncomfortable or anything. We're gonna find out!”

“Do you need me to stay?” Yeosang asks, and Hongjoong hesitates, then shakes his head.

“I will... Call if I require anything, First Master,” he says, and his voice is just as sweet as Jongho said it was. “Thank you, for your consideration of my needs.”

“You're welcome,” Yeosang says, kissing his forehead. He looks down at him for a moment and then steps away, waving to San. “Have fun, boys.” He leaves the room. San and Hongjoong are left there, staring at one another. There's a long moment of silence.

“Would you feel better if I took my clothes off,” San asks, point-blank. “Because frankly this is a lot of clothing for me when I don't _have_ to be wearing clothes.”

At this point, San is nearly always nude inside the house. Clothes are annoying. And get in the way of intimacy he wants. And stick to him, and catch on things, and just—are inconvenient as hell, really, but for the sake of decency and the comfort of the others (_Seonghwa._) he has clothes. He usually only wears them outside, and when they go into town. That's basically what he and Hongjoong are here for—decency, and when they leave the house. Not that Hongjoong is going to be leaving the house any time soon, but the option should be there for him.

“If... You feel compelled to undress, then I—”

“Hongjoong,” San says. “Would you feel better if I took my clothes off.”

San watches the internal struggle and feels a little bit guilty. It's been what, three or four weeks since they took Hongjoong out of the pit, and asking him to make those kinds of decisions might be a bit much. But still. Hongjoong _does _make a decision—he nods, and as San pulls off his own clothes to leave himself nude and unprotected, Hongjoong does the same. He drops the blanket and then the two of them are on even ground.

“Here,” San says, motioning Hongjoong over to the rack. “Touch these. What feels best to you? We got these for you, but we weren't sure what was going to feel comfortable.”

“Most... Modern cloths are very comfortable, Young Master San,” Hongjoong says, though he reaches out anyway. “I am accustomed to fabrics that are much more coarse, with weaves less fine.”

“Well, welcome to the future,” San says. “When rayon is a thing and silk is available for everyone.” San isn't surprised that Hongjoong's fingers have stopped on a dusty lavender colored silk shirt. It's worn thin and big enough to be a dress on him. San urges him to take it from the rack. The clothes hanger confuses him for a moment and it's _adorable, _but then he is fighting with the buttons, so San takes the shirt to save Hongjoong from himself.

“Lift your arms,” he says, and when Hongjoong does, he helps him pull the shirt on, letting it fall against him. It swamps him entirely, gives him little sweater-paws. Hongjoong's fingers smooth down his own arms and chest, touching the hem which is somewhere near his lower thighs. “How does it feel?”

“...Good,” Hongjoong replies, looking up at him. Hongjoong isn't that much smaller than San, just like he's not much smaller than Yeosang, but he _feels _smaller. He feels small and defenseless and new. “It is very soft.”

“Mm,” San nods, feels his smile stretch across his face. “There are a few more like that. Do you like to wear pants? Or do you think skirts are better?” He and Wooyoung had chosen a variety of clothing across all options—the only things they all had in common was that they were lightweight and soft to the touch.

“I am unaccustomed to the underclothes that you all wear,” Hongjoong says, looking at the underwear San abandoned on the floor. “They were not prevalent, when... When I was made.”

“Well, they're not necessary either,” San replies. “You absolutely don't have to wear them, Hongjoong.” It breaks San's heart to see how confused Hongjoong seems by this simple statement.

“You don't have to wear clothes ever, if you don't want. We just want you to have options, that's all. I mean, I like wearing clothes sometimes, but normally I don't.”

“I see,” Hongjoong says, looking at the rack again. “I do not enjoy the feeling of... Being restricted. This cloth is... Good,” he is touching his own chest again. “Things like it, I believe, will be best.” So San helps Hongjoong try on a few maxi dresses and more silk shirts—a pair of silk pants with elastic ankles that were probably part of a halloween costume once, and a few soft, tattered skirts. It doesn't surprise him that Hongjoong prefers to wear the skirts with nothing else. That the dresses feel strange because there is so much material they have weight, that Hongjoong likes to wear the shirts with his waist through the neck and the arms tied around his hips. That he is pleased with the sheets and few bolts of worn out cotton, ugly patterned rayon and out-of-season silk they'd found at a fabric store.

They are sitting on the floor, with Hongjoong wrapped up in the last of a bolt of dirt-brown lightweight fabric that is nearly see through with how soft the weave is and how thin the threads are. They are surrounded by cloth, and San is laughing at something Hongjoong just said about the material having only ever been suited for men of a certain station because surely, anyone else would have been killed just for wearing such an atrocious thing.

“It's a good thing you're so beautiful then,” San says with a laugh. “You look good in everything we've put you in!” San realizes that Hongjoong is staring at him.

“What,” San asks, still smiling.

“You... Remind me very much of a eunuch I once knew, Young Master San.” Hongjoong says. “He was a performer, a dancer. He smiled much like you do.”

“Maybe he's my ancestor,” San says, nodding firmly. “It wouldn't surprise me! I've been told that my looks are pretty singular.”

“They are, Young Master San.”

“Hongjoong?”

“Yes.”

“Please don't call me that,” San says, gently. “Please. I'm not above you in station, I know... I know it's hard for you, it must be so hard, but... Think of it this way. Before Yeosang found me, I... Was in the same position you were. A bad one. In unwilling service to someone else.”

Hongjoong looks uncomfortable, shrinking away, and San takes his hand very, very gently. He holds it as though Hongjoong is made of spun sugar and liable to melt or shatter at any moment.

“I'm just San, Hongjoong. I understand... Some of your pains, and I'm just San.”

“Just San,” Hongjoong says, softly. San can see that his eyes are watery and reddening. “You speak as though you have known my life.”

“I've been a whore, if that's what you mean,” San says. “I was drugged, turned, and kept for a long time. Yeosang—Yeosang _saved me. _I'm very grateful to him. So... Yes, I know a little of your life, Hongjoong. I'm not judging you. I am not above you in station, that's all.”

“Aah,” Hongjoong says, and those tears fall. San's heart breaks. “Aah, Young Master San. You do so very much remind me of a eunuch I once knew.”

“Did he comfort you,” San asks, reaching out to touch Hongjoong's face. He's grateful Hongjoong doesn't flinch away. “Your eunuch. Did he bring you warmth, and joy, and safety?”

“He did,” Hongjoong says, before closing his eyes. More tears squeeze out and drip down his face. San, moving on instinct, kisses them away. He's not surprised that Hongjoong leans into the contact.

“While he lived.”

“May I comfort you in his memory, then,” San asks, lips trailing across Hongjoong's cheeks and jaw. “May I bring you warmth and joy and safety here? Now? We of equal station, with no one above or below?”

San feels like he's unlocked some kind of secret level in a game as Hongjoong nods and presses to him. San slides his hands up to cup Hongjoong's head and kisses him, tastes his teeth and tongue and blood. The cloth on the floor around them is soft as San leans back into it and brings Hongjoong with him, laying Hongjoong on top of him and holding him there. They writhe against one another, find the good places where their touches feel best and San whines into Hongjoong's mouth, arching up against him. It's juvenile and almost chaste, really—just the two of them rubbing together, moaning softly into one another's mouths. San's hands are on Hongjoong's waist, Hongjoong's hands are in San's hair. They just kiss, hold one another, turning in the cloth and pressing against each other.

“Stop—” Hongjong gasps, and San stops. Immediately sits up, moves away, despite his swollen lips and red cheeks and how good it feels to be pressed to Hongjoong.

“Are you okay?” he asks, anxious. “Did I hurt you?”

Hongjoong shakes his head and shivers, squirming. “I—the clothes—I—” He flushes, and San laughs, nodding and reaching to dance his fingertips across Hongjoong's tense belly.

“Do you want me to get them out of the way?” he asks, peeking at Hongjoong through his hair. “Or would you just like me to make sure you don't make a mess?”

Hongjoong's eyes get very wide. His mouth drops open and San sees those terrifying teeth in full for the first time. They're savage, they're primal and beautiful. San bends to kiss Hongjoong's belly as his fingers tease the fabric down.

“You—” Hongjoong starts, shivering. “You need not—”

“Oh, but I want to,” San promises, bending further, licking at Hongjoong's lower stomach, nipping the tender skin, raking his nails across the hollows of Hongjoong's hips to the sound of a shivering whine, to the feel of Hongjoong's erection straining up against the last fabric barrier between them.

“I want to _pleasure _you, Hongjoong,” San says, untying the arms of the shirt and shoving them aside to expose Hongjoong to him. He moves to straddle Hongjoong's clothed legs, gets on his knees and elbows with his face at Hongjoong's erection. In this position, his own erection is cradled against the place where Hongjoong's calves meet. San rolls his hips lazily against the fabric of a stray maxi dress draped across Hongjoong's legs. His mouth presses kisses to the smooth scars of Hongjoong's groin.

“May I?”

“Please,” Hongjoong nods, arching up and trying to spread his legs, but San's weight on top of him is too much, so he just reaches over his head and grabs at some of the loose fabric on the floor. San is just as eager as he always is—just as willing to pleasure someone he cares about. It's hard _not _to care about Hongjoong, when he's so enthusiastic about the smallest things, when he's so anxious, when he's so willing to do what it takes to make others comfortable. And he and San have so much in common in their histories. Perhaps not in intensity, but still.

It will always feel good, San thinks, to pleasure someone because he wants to. It will always feel good to receive pleasure he wants from someone who _wants _to please him. Maybe that's why Hongjoong isn't flinching or saying he doesn't want to. Maybe San's sincerity is obvious. And if Hongjoong didn't want San to touch him like this, was truly afraid? He could probably rip San's head from his shoulders.

“Does this feel good,” San asks anyway, between sucks at Hongjoong's length, kisses to his balls and thighs and hips. “Do you want me to keep doing this?”

“I—” Hongjoong is panting, shivering, trying to pull his legs apart. “I—please—”

“What do you want,” San asks. Hongjoong gives a beautiful shake, opens his light brown eyes, and licks his own lips.

“I want you to find your pleasure in me, San,” Hongjoong says. It makes San shake, too. “I am—I desire this, this touch—”

San draws away. Gets up, drags his hand down Hongjoong's chest and stomach as Hongjoong squirms out of _all _the cloth and lifts his legs, holds himself under the knee and rolls his small body up. He's covered in ugly scars everywhere, and San kisses them as he moves to be in a position to give Hongjoong what he wants. He parts Hongjoong's cheeks and licks between them, giving a soft groan while Hongjoong laughs, breathless.

What a brat, San realizes, as Hongjoong grins cheekily up at him, baring his teeth for a moment. San gets up onto his knees and slicks himself with what spit he can gather into one hand. He positions himself and starts to push in without hesitation or pause. Hongjoong laughs and then moans, arching up. It's an easy thrust. Hongjoong is wet on the inside. Warm.

“Did Yeosang fuck you before you came down here,” San asks, laughing and settling in, wiggling, pushing on Hongjoong's thighs until he's bent nearly in half, his weight resting on his shoulders and upper back with his legs up over himself. “God did you come down here, full of his blood and cum—”

“_Yes,_” Hongjoong says, grinning. He sets his tongue on his lower lip and San thrusts hard enough that Hongjoong's tip slaps his own mouth. Hongjoong moans, and San does it again. It's an awkward position but it's worth it, because he can watch Hongjoong suckle and lick at his own crown when his hands are pinned underneath San's. Every time San thrusts, more cum is squeezed out around him, and Hongjoong's cock pushes into his own mouth for a short suckle. So San stops thrusting, and instead gets up high on his knees, deep inside Hongjoong, half against his lap. He bends over Hongjoong, rests his elbows on either side of Hongjoong's head. Hongjoong is curled up so tightly that his cock is on his own lips.

“Suck it,” San pants, entranced. Hongjoong opens his mouth and as San rocks his hips, Hongjoong sucks himself. He moans and mewls—there is saliva spilling from the corners of his mouth and he tightens up every few thrusts, maybe biting himself.

“God, can you do it,” San asks, rocking, tense. “Make yourself cum like that, fuck, I wanna do that, taste myself like that, holy shit.” San's thought about it, but never _done _it. Too nervous to look stupid if someone caught him trying. Which is dumb, but still.

“That's so fucking hot, Hongjoong that's so, I wanna see it, do it, holy fuck—”

San can't stop staring. He stares and jerks his hips and _feels _Hongjoong tense up in orgasm—watches him cum into his own mouth and on his own face, listens to him moan and mewl and whine.

“Oh my _fucking god—_” San cums hard and fast and sudden, watching Hongjoong rub his tip across his own lips, unable to blink or think or do anything but capture in his memory the way Hongjoong tongues at himself, suckles at his own crown, licks at his slit and lays back to show San his full mouth, his messy lips. San pushes himself down, barely able to stop himself from pulling out of Hongjoong so they can kiss—hot and sticky and _filthy _in all these nice clothes he and Wooyoung had picked out. Damn. What a mess they've made.

Hongjoong's arms are around San's shoulders. San sits them up with Hongjoong still in his lap and kisses him until he has no trace of ejaculation left in his mouth. He sucks at Hongjoong's lips as Hongjoong kisses at his, the two of them make soft sounds for one another and slowly San lays back, leaving Hongjoong on top of him to shift and move and sway. He's beautiful.

“Did you find your pleasure, San,” Hongjoong asks. More than the question, it's the fact that Hongjoong calls him by his namethat makes San shiver in delight.

“As well as you found yours, Hongjoong,” he replies, and reaches up to pull Hongjoong down for a slow, wet kiss. Hongjoong clenches around him, but San is exhausted and so is Hongjoong, because he sighs and lays down, head on San's chest.

“Thank you for pleasuring me,” Hongjoong murmurs.

“I'm glad I could pleasure you,” San says into Hongjoong's hair. “I enjoyed that a _lot._ We should do it again, when you feel up to it.”

Hongjoong is quiet for a while. “First Master Yeosang said... That the others may not be... Willing to engage with me in this way. Young Master Jongho informed me that he does not... Touch others like this, and thus would not touch me like this.” he says. “But this is... Familiar to me. It feels safe. More than perhaps anything else, this is something that I know, and... Thank you, San. For allowing me to... To do this with you.”

San's heart is warm and full. He hugs Hongjoong tightly, curls up around him and kisses his face. Hongjoong blinks at him in surprise, like he didn't expect that kind of affection outside of sex.

“I will tell you if I don't want to,” San promises. “But I like this a lot too, Hongjoong. I like this kind of closeness and touching. So you can always come to me when you need it. The others... Might have different ways of expressing affection and love, but I like it this way. I've always liked it this way, even before, so don't worry.” He gives Hongjoong another tight squeeze. To his relief, Hongjoong gives him a shy little squeeze back.

“Please don't worry.”

“I will endeavor not to,” Hongjoong says. The two of them lay there in the mess of fabric and kiss, talk softly of their histories and swap stories about clients and lovers. They have sex again, this time in the missionary position and it's so slow and close and warm that the two of them don't notice Yeosang standing there until San whimpers out his orgasm, trembling between Hongjoong's legs and even then, they only really notice because Yeosang laughs.

“I can see,” Yeosang says, stepping away from the closed door and easily coming when they both wave for him and draw him close. “That you two are going to be just fine, mm?”

“First Master,” Hongjoong breathes, and San echoes the reverence in his tone.

“Yeosang...”

San and Hongjoong share kisses against the skin of Yeosang's cock, smear his cum across their cheeks and lips and tongues. The two of them are gentle echoes of one another across a hundred lifetimes, and Yeosang smooths their hair, draws them each up for kisses. He urges them first to a bath and then to bed after Hongjoong says, sounding a little frightened, that he's getting too hungry to ignore.

San only leaves because Hongjoong insists it's for his own safety, but he promises to see him tomorrow, with a cheekily deep and inappropriate-for-third-party-viewing kiss to his mouth.

San heads downstairs to clean up the mess they made in the parlor—to fold the cloth and the clothes, to set the unwanted ones aside for the others or to be used for something else. He feels good about this, about what he's done with Hongjoong. Maybe Jongho can be his stabilizing non-sexual element, but San is... Inherently sexual, or so he feels, so it's good that things worked out this way. He can definitely continue to help Hongjoong like this, because sex isn't always about _sex. _It's about a lot of other things, too. San can help, like Hongjoong's eunuch friend, all those lifetimes ago.

San giggles, thinking that his own voice is high enough that he could probably be a eunuch! Maybe he should practice singing, maybe that would help Hongjoong, too. So San sings and dances his way through the task of cleaning up, performing for no one at all, and feels his heart growing fuller, and fuller, and fuller.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> san and hongjoong have so many parallels and i thought it was important for hongjoong to be able to communicate with someone like this: who uses sex so readily as a means of 'speech/understanding.'
> 
> next on our list? not so much. ;]


	29. Chapter 29

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> there was another chapter, between this one and the last one, but i couldn't make it work :< so have this instead.   
sex in this chapter <3

(mid june)

Wooyoung sometimes still has nightmares. Nowhere near as frequently as Jongho or Mingi. They're rare enough that they catch him off guard, wake him with a sharp inhale that usually doesn't wake anyone else, luckily. He can creep out of bed and go out onto the back porch, sit on the stairs and just feel the Louisiana warmth around him, like he is right now.

It's almost twilight, the sky red and purple and shot through with orange and pink over the green of the trees like a garden in full bloom. Wooyoung feels like he's covered in a cold sweat, even though he's only wearing a loose tank top and briefs and it's May and he can't even sweat anymore. But he's out on the back steps, hugging himself, rocking back and forth and chewing at his thumb and not really looking at anything when a small, cool hand touches his arm.

It's enough to make Wooyoung give an aborted shriek, jumping out of his skin. Hongjoong jerks back, alarmed, as though _he's _the one who got touched with no warning while trying to recover from a bad dream that felt so real his chest still aches.

“Oh,” Wooyoung says, swallowing. “Hongjoong.”

“Wooyoung,” Hongjoong says, his voice delicate as his features. “Are you all right?”

The longer time goes on, the more Hongjoong seems to learn about and grow comfortable with speech and words. His voice is still nice, Wooyoung thinks. Soothing. Like Yeosang's, but higher.

“Yeah,” Wooyoung nods, wiping at his face with his hand. It comes back bloody, as he'd known it would. “Yeah, Hongjoong I'm fine.”

Hongjoong tips his head and quirks his eyebrow. Wooyoung doesn't know what to make of the motion but somehow isn't surprised when Hongjoong moves up behind him and sits, chest-to-back, and rests his cheek on Wooyoung's hair. His hands find Wooyoung's hands, and hold them. He's comfortable with Wooyoung, because Wooyoung was the second to touch him, so at least he's not physically intimidated.

“Tell me?” Hongjoong asks. He's still working on figuring out how to ask for things. Wooyoung thinks it's sad that Hongjoong has trouble asking to feed, asking to touch, to be included. It's hard for the rest of them to extend those invitations, too, because they don't know how to deal with him. But Wooyoung is tired, and cold despite the warmth of the air, and Hongjoong isn't pressuring him—just sitting behind him, rocking with him, back and forth, back and forth.

“I had a nightmare,” Wooyoung whispers. He feels Hongjoong nod. “About... What happened. After I got turned.”

“Aah,” Hongjoong nods again, his grip tightening a little. Wooyoung doesn't know the intimate details about Hongjoong's turning—neither Hongjoong nor Seonghwa seem to want to speak about it—but he knows it was difficult, and painful. “Tell me?”

Wooyoung shakes his head, hating that he's crying, hating that he's as old as he is and it still upsets him. It's stupid, it was years ago, he should be over it. But Hongjoong is gently turning Wooyoung's body, urging him to rest his head on Hongjoong's shoulder, cradling him comfortably.

“Tell me?” Hongjoong asks again, his voice so warm, so soft. Comforting.

“I just,” Wooyoung says, wiping at his face. “He just... Lied to me. He lied to me, over and over and over, and... He used me and when he was done using me he gave me to this woman, and she. I mean she put me in this room and it was so bright. Not, not the sun, just... Light. I don't... remember how long I was there. I couldn't open my eyes, it hurt. I was so hungry, I was so scared. There wasn't anything to hear, no heartbeat, no voices, just this... Horrible, burning light I couldn't hide from. She could have—she could have made the sun shine on me any time she wanted and I wouldn't have known until I was...” Wooyoung shudders. Hongjoong tucks Wooyoung's head under his chin.

“Gone,” Hongjoong provides, and Wooyoung nods, wiping at his eyes again, feeling _even more _foolish, for being afraid of such a thing.

“She starved me,” Wooyoung whispers, and Hongjoong's grip tightens. “She starved me until she could truss me up and sell me like a piece of...”

“You were used,” Hongjoong murmurs, and Wooyoung nods, turning to press his face into Hongjoong's bare chest.

“I was _helpless._ I hate—I hate it, I hate feeling that way, I—”

“Out of control,” Hongjoong says, fingers moving gently through Wooyoung's pale hair. “Yes. I understand this... Fear. This cruelty.”

“I want it to go away,” Wooyoung says, vision blurring red, finally turning to embrace Hongjoong from his lower step. Hongjoong, who is smaller than he is, but feels so much bigger right now as he pets Wooyoung's hair and hums gentle assurances. Hongjoong kisses his forehead the way Yeosang and Yunho do. “Why won't it just _go away._”

“These things... Never really go away,” Hongjoong says, sounding as though he is picking each word very carefully, analyzing them before he speaks. “They only fade. Become less... Painful.”

“How do you know that,” Wooyoung hiccups, hating that he's asked, because Hongjoong would know. He's older than any of them, he's _ancient. _

“All pains fade,” Hongjoong assures, still rocking Wooyoung in his arms. “All pains... Become distant. Not forgotten, but... Less immediate. They will not choke you. They will not disturb your sleep.”

“I want it to go away _now._”

“Patience,” Hongjoong hums, kissing Wooyoung's temple. “Patience, Wooyoung.”

It had taken _weeks, _nearly months for Hongjoong to stop calling all of them—even Seonghwa—_young master._ Longer still for him to adjust to having his own room up in the third floor, to one side of the top of the great room that separated each wing. Hongjoong is still confused by his privacy, doesn't understand why none of them will just waltz into his personal space without asking.

But it feels to be called his name with so much affection, especially by Hongjoong, who has no reason to be so kind and accepting and tolerant of Wooyoung's dramatic bullshit.

“I want to go back to bed,” Wooyoung whispers, as the sky finally starts bleeding into violet and blue and black. Hongjoong nods, starting to let go, but Wooyoung holds on tight. He wants to be comforted, he wants... “With you. I want to sleep with you.”

Hongjoong pauses, as though considering this, turning the words over in his mind and inspecting them.

“Do you wish to sleep,” Hongjoong finally says. “Or do you wish to lay with me.”

Wooyoung wants to laugh at Hongjoong's archaic language but instead just nods his head.

“Both.”

“Come, then.” Hongjoong stands, holds one of Wooyoung's hands. He draws Wooyoung up the back stairs to his room, which is warm and light and wide. Hongjoong prefers candles for lighting, unaccustomed still to the brightness of electric lights, so Yunho and Yeosang had gotten him a few ever-burning candles from Jaehwan. Their light is dim and soft as Hongjoong leads Wooyoung into the room and closes the door behind them. He doesn't lock it.

Wooyoung knows that Hongjoong will sleep with any of them any time he is asked. He has, before—with San and Seonghwa, in addition to Yeosang and Yunho. But Wooyoung isn't sure if any of them have wanted it the way he does. He watches Hongjoong undress as he pulls off his own sleeping clothes, and touches Hongjoong's hand when he makes to get onto the bed and lay down.

“Not like that,” Wooyoung whispers, swallowing, and laying on the bed himself. He leans into the pillows at the headboard and spreads his legs. “Like this.”

Hongjoong looks at him for a moment, as though trying to determine if Wooyoung is serious, then climbs onto the bed and moves to kneel between Wooyoung's thighs. He bends forward, putting one hand on the mattress just at Wooyoung's shoulder. Hongjoong looks down at him with his light brown eyes. Even just his weight pressing forward makes Wooyoung shiver, spread his thighs wider. It's rare that he desires intimacy like this; Wooyoung likes to be the one giving direct pleasure if he can, instead of passively providing. But right now... Right now, this is what he wants.

“Like this?” Hongjoong asks, and Wooyoung nods, hissing in a breath when Hongjoong's other hand trails from his ribs to his hips, cool and firm as he holds on. He can't help but notice the differences in their bodies—they are both lean, but Wooyoung is noticeably more muscular. Hongjoong's strength is almost all supernatural, he never had a body that was built up before he was turned. Wooyoung had a labor job as a young man, and had been quite proud of the state of his body—strong and fit. _Thick, _as San likes to tease.

“Yes,” Wooyoung says, making a soft noise when Hongjoong rests his weight on both hands and leans down, crowding Wooyoung's body, putting them into full contact. It makes Wooyoung moan, high and sweet. “Oh _yes._”

Hongjoong nods, and moves his hands under Wooyoung's shoulders, holding the back of his neck and head, keeping his body half-curled as they kiss, slow and wet and deep, oh god. Wooyoung had known Hongjoong had to be a good kisser, between his age and San's recounting—but he's an _excellent _kisser, a perfect balance of lip and tongue. He puts little cuts on each of their tongues with his unbearably sharp teeth and lets blood pass between them in an intimate, _intimate _motion. In this position—like this—the sharing of blood feels like an orgasm in and of itself, just because they're so close, feeling so much of one another. Wooyoung swallows more of Hongjoong's blood, tries to slide his tongue into Hongjoong's mouth so he can return the favor. He's glad that Hongjoong is well fed enough now that things like this don't drive him into a frenzy. It's a beautiful thing to share.

Wooyoung can feel the blood in the sides of his mouth trickling down. He wraps his arms around Hongjoong's neck and presses his hips up, hiccuping at the pleasure, at the warmth and intimacy of how they're touching one another. It's not like it is with any of the others, though the emotions are similar. Wooyoung wants to be taken care of. Hongjoong is taking care of him.

“Please,” he whispers, as Hongjoong licks at his tongue to heal him, as he does the same to Hongjoong. “Please, Hongjoong?”

Hongjoong nods, reaches for the lubricant on his bedside table. Apparently he was accustomed to only using spit, which was horrible, and he'd seemed positively tickled by the invention of something that specifically made this type of sex—taboo, in most decent social circles of his time—more pleasurable. The snap of the cap makes Wooyoung shiver. Hongjoong's fingers on his rim even moreso.

“Don't need to,” He breathes. “You don't need to do that, just—just push in, I can take it—”

Wooyoung will be the first to admit that he's a bit of a slut, really enjoys having sex with whoever will engage with him, and the best part about being undead is that... Well, he doesn't need as much preparation and gentleness as he would if he were still human. Hongjoong gives him a slow look, but nods, and reaches to slick himself, the sound of it enough to make Wooyoung groan and try to open his legs _even wider. _

Th sound is lewd, slick, and then Hongjoong is guiding himself against and into Wooyoung. Wooyoung moans, moans and whines, holds Hongjoong tighter as he seats himself, warm and solid and comforting. He drags a blanket over their bodies, over his own form and Wooyoung's spread legs. He's physically smaller than Wooyoung, by a little bit, but as his hands move to grip the headboard, as his knees part to give himself more leverage against Wooyoung's curled body, he feels very large, indeed.

Wooyoung hiccups, hugs his arms around Hongjoong's ribs as Hongjoong pulls himself forward with his grip on the headboard. Wooyoung's hands splay on Hongjoong's shoulder blades beneath the blanket as he thrusts slow and deep and deliberate, much like his kisses. Wooyoung tries not to whine but it feels good to be so crowded and hot, like Hongjoong is protecting him from anything that might hurt him. Wooyoung wraps his legs around Hongjoong's small waist and urges him to bend further down, so he can kiss at his chest and neck. Hongjoong isn't as muscular as Jongho or even Wooyoung himself, but he's so strong. He holds on to the headboard with one hand and reaches to hold the underside of Wooyoung's thigh with the other, shifting his angle and making sure Wooyoung doesn't slide down with the same movement.

“Oh god,” Wooyoung breathes, trying to get closer, unable to do so. “H-hongjoong, that—feels good—”

“It is meant to,” Hongjoong murmurs, still thrusting, slow and rhythmic and deliberate. Wooyoung is much more used to fast, fun and frantic bouts of sex. It's rare he wants this and thus rare that he gets it, but Wooyoung feels like Hongjoong might be able to take him like this for _hours. _Like Hongjoong could fuck him like this all night until Wooyoung was coming dry and he wouldn't care. It feels good. It feels good to feel so cared for, so _safe. _

Wooyoung orgasms like that, succumbing to Hongjoong's slow and insistent pace. He cries a little as Hongjoong pulls him away from the headboard and places him onto the pillows. Hongjoong licks away his tears. Hongjoong braces himself with his elbows over Wooyoung's shoulders, and they share bloody kisses as Hongjoong moves harder, faster, at Wooyoung's desperate request. Wooyoung's thighs are shaky and quivering as he holds them open with his own hands, crying out loudly when the force of Hongjoong's belly hitting his groin makes him cum again, his entire lower body jerking up and down uncontrollably, belly tense, eyes wide open.

Finally, hot beneath the blankets, Hongjoong pulls one of Wooyoung's legs up over his shoulder, the other wrapping around his hip and thigh, and really _takes _Wooyoung. Holds him down in his grip, kisses and bites his neck, sucks, offers his wrist for Wooyoung to do the same. Wooyoung does, his mind lost in the sex and the blood and the feeling of bodies snapping together. He reaches to touch himself, whines and shivers.

“Please,” he whimpers. Begs. “Please, I want—in me, please—”

Wooyoung doesn't think Hongjoong's ever been asked something like that before. Ever been offered the chance to do something like that before, because he snaps his hips hard four times, five, then halts, pressed in as deep as he can be, teeth bared against Wooyoung's lips as Wooyoung strokes himself, frantic, gasping and—

Wooyoung isn't prepared for Hongjoong's bite. He isn't prepared for the push of his tongue, the hand in his hair, the sheer _force _with which Hongjoong clings to him, pulling their bodies closer, closer, to the point of almost-pain. He drops his head back, feels Hongjoong at his neck, biting, tonguing, biting, tonguing, savage and beautiful and so, so kind. So kind as the bites gentle, as his grip loosens but he still doesn't let go of Wooyoung, who holds on desperately.

“Stay,” Wooyoung pleas, holding on to Hongjoong as the night grows deeper, darker—as there is stirring in the house below them and Wooyoung simply doesn't care. Let the world continue to turn, just let him be safe from his memories and his nightmares, here in this quiet place for a little while longer. “Stay, don't go.”

Hongjoong doesn't.

As though he senses how much it means to Wooyoung, Hongjoong doesn't leave when he softens, slips out. Just stays there in the bed with him, leaving Wooyoung's leg around his hip and his hand in Wooyoung's hair as he holds him, just holds him, and lets Wooyoung cry like an idiot into his chest. He's not even sure why he's crying, though it doesn't seem to matter to Hongjoong.

“Shh, shh,” he hums, kissing Wooyoung's forehead, hand rubbing up and down Wooyoung's back as Wooyoung clings like a child. He only pulls away long enough to light another candle on the bedside table. “Shh. You are safe. It is over. You are safe.”

Wooyoung isn't sure if Hongjoong is talking to him, to himself, or to both of them. He decides it doesn't matter, as he drags himself up for more of those delicious, intimate and bloody kisses until he falls asleep, listening to Hongjoong hum, feeling one small hand on his side—warm with his blood, and comforting in its tenderness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> they're so interesting ;-;   
writing is very hard right now, please be patient, i'm working to the best of my ability around RL stuff and the commissions i need to finish. thanks for your understanding <3


	30. Chapter 30

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as some of you know, i switched computers! no more broken e key!!

Yeosang smiles as Hongjoong creeps downstairs like a ghost, silent and pale. He waves Hongjoong over from where he sits on the couch, motioning for him to sit down. Hongjoong does, folding his legs under himself.

“How are you feeling,” Yeosang asks, because he knows that he has to ask straight forwardly. He'd had a very long discussion with Yunho about what Hongjoong was going to need as far as support and direction went—this is one of those things. Nothing can be left to guesswork. Directness is necessary. It's been a while and directness is working, so he's going to keep it up.

“Very well, First Master Yeosang.” Hongjoong says. He still has trouble meeting eyes, but he's smiling, showing the very tips of his teeth. “I have been attending young master Wooyoung.”

Yeosang had felt Wooyoung jerk up just after sundown, had also known that he hadn't come back to bed, not even after night fell completely. It's past midnight, now.

“Where is he?”

“Asleep in my chamber. He was... Distressed. He had a bad dream. I set out a remedy. It is good, he is sleeping soundly, now.”

Yeosang had thought that Hongjoong's interest in 'magical remedies' was a bit strange, before he considered that in Hongjoong's time such things would have been considered normal. Granted, he'd been in Korea for that time, but the principles were the same. It was easy for him to know and connect herbs and medicinal plants; he seemed to have a 'feel' for that kind of magic.

Yeosang and Yunho had no problem indulging him in what seemed like little more than a somewhat strange and quirky habit—at least until Hongjoong came to them with a few hand-molded cones of incense and a promise that they would make it easier for Mingi to fall asleep. Mingi tended to just run himself into exhaustion, most of the time, and it wasn't really healthy, but it was difficult for him to slow down long enough to actually sleep the way most of them did. Sure enough, one of Hongjoong's little cones lit at his bedside put Mingi to sleep like a child. After that they'd just... Given Hongjoong what he asked for, because it was clear he knew what he was doing. That meant going to the city, which had been... An experience.

Hongjoong had _violently _protested against the cutting of his hair, had loathed having to wear clothes, had panicked at the prospect of getting in the car. It was a three-day ordeal to get him into a place where he was comfortable to go and then, of course, there was Jaehwan.

Yeosang had thought Hongjoong would find Jaehwan difficult to deal with, especially considering his own first meeting with the witch, but Hongjoong was not afraid of or intimidated by Jaehwan at all. When Jaehwan tried his usual trick with the silver bell, Hongjoong simply picked it up and rang it, humming at its sweet tone.

_Such things will not work on me, sorcerer, _he'd said, smiling somewhat sadly. _There is a very fine line between the Undying and the Deathless, and I have been torn across it. _

While Hongjoong had been gathering things he needed by sight and smell with the store closed against any other guests, Jaehwan had hissed at Yeosang that he'd never met a vampire that old, nevermind one created from a death of an immortal, and how the _hell _had Yeosang found something like that?

After Yeosang explained, Jaehwan had been the one to explain that the place they'd found Hongjoong—which none of them had ever been able to find again, just the swamp going on for miles and miles—was a magical place that had to be accessed by an exact person, at the exact time, in an exact place, where the curse holding Hongjoong in place could be broken. Even if the actual, _original_ place had been in Korea, the magic of it would have found Yeosang, attached itself to him, and waited. The place hadn't wanted to be held prisoner to Hongjoong, just as Hongjoong hadn't wanted to be held prisoner to it. They'd been trapped with each other, and now that place was gone, back to wherever it had come from. After that revelation it no longer surprised Yeosang to find that Hongjoong, in addition to his many other skills, had talents in magic.

“Did you burn incense for him?” Yeosang asks, curious, and Hongjoong shakes his head.

“A simple candle,” he replies, sitting down in one of the chairs and drawing one knee up to his chest. “For sweet rest and easy waking. Its stone core makes it very strong. I hope he does not mind. I did not ask, for fear he may... Be unhappy, with my assumptions of his conditions.”

Hongjoong looks to the side and his profile is very modern, now. He did, after a few weeks, cut his hair. It's still a bit long as he likes to pull his fingers through it. He's taken to wearing more clothes, though he refuses to wear underclothes, or anything tighter than joggers. He usually doesn't even wear more than a shirt with his neck through the waist and the arms tied around his hips, claiming it's uncomfortable and strange on his skin. He is more accustomed to being nude, or wearing the simplest armor and robes.

Hongjoong's features are delicate. His hands are small and his fingers are thin, his nails more like claws that he allows Yeosang to trim and file regularly. He is self-conscious of his teeth.

Hongjoong has been delighted with the invention of lube, chapstick, and lotion that doesn't leave an oily film on his body. He likes different scents of body washes, and Yeosang has collected a small hoard of 3 ounce bottles, so Hongjoong can pick a different one every day if he chooses, which he does. Hongjoong likes to go into the swamp to collect wild flowers and he still usually sleeps during most of the day, though he tries to make sure he gets out into the sun as often as he can. The necklace—or rather, the spell shaped like a necklace—just under his skin brings him much joy.

“I don't think he'll be unhappy,” Yeosang assures. “He'll probably be glad you're looking out for him.”

“Young master Wooyoung deserves all good things,” Hongjoong says, smiling a little and hugging his leg to his chest. “As all the young masters do.”

“You shouldn't spoil them so much.” Yeosang says, teasing. Hongjoong looks at him for a moment, as though judging his tone, and ends up smiling more, able to detect the humor in Yeosang's words.

“I enjoy spoiling them. I enjoy...” Hongjoong looks up, then hums. “I enjoy taking care of them. Serving them in what ways I am allowed.”

“I think they like it, too.” Yeosang says, meaning every word of it. Even Yunho seems to take delight in letting Hongjoong 'mother' him once in a while.

“I wish you would allow me to care for you also, First Master Yeosang,” Hongjoong says, peering at him from the chair, seven feet away.

“When I need to be cared for, I will come to you.” Yeosang promises, standing and stretching his arms over his head. “In the meantime, come with me. The children are in the swamp and I think Seonghwa might be losing his mind trying to keep them under control.”

“Children should be allowed to play,” Hongjoong says, but he follows Yeosang anyway, out into the back yard where the moon hangs, bright and full and golden. Seonghwa is, indeed, sitting on the back porch, groaning. Yeosang laughs.

“What's wrong, Seonghwa,” Yeosang asks, and Seonghwa sits up, rolling his eyes.

“They're children.”

“Yes,” Yeosang agrees, watching Seonghwa lean back onto his hands.

“They're children who have decided that they need to find a copperhead or a cottonmouth to bring back and show off like cats with dead birds,” Seonghwa says, tone flat. “They could at least come back with a Burmese Python. Those are invasive and terrible.”

“Did you tell them that?”

“Of course,” Seonghwa says. “Who knows if they'll listen to me.”

“The children always listen to you,” Hongjoong says, voice soft.

“Only if they want to,” Seonghwa says.

Yeosang watches them curiously. Seonghwa is still awkward with Hongjoong, though Yeosang and Yunho have not yet figured out _why. _Yeosang thinks it's probably none of his business anyway. The two of them will figure it out on their own. They're adults. Even now, Hongjoong sits on the stairs with Seonghwa and watches the treeline. They aren't close together, but they aren't very far apart, either. Yeosang quietly slips back into the house as they fall into the kind of silence only vampires seem able to experience in one another's company.

Yeosang finds Yunho easily, half-asleep in his bed, and Yunho groans as Yeosang gets undressed and slides in beside him, humming.

“S'late,” Yunho grumbles.

“You were up late,” Yeosang reminds him, wiggling close, kissing Yunho's forehead, cheeks, and lips. Yunho easily opens his mouth for the kisses, moaning soft and low in his throat. Yeosang adores this about him—that Yunho is so open and honest with what arouses him, long past being embarrassed about what he finds pleasurable. Yeosang knows he loves this—a long, slow wake up made of kisses and touching and an orgasm, sometimes two.

He's ready for Yunho's hand in his hair, smoothing, urging, never grabbing or pulling. He's ready for Yunho's leg thrown over his hip, for Yunho's bigger body urging him closer. Yeosang laughs into his mouth, reaching down to pull Yunho's thigh up higher, jerk his weight closer. Yeosang thinks that Yunho probably doesn't get enough of this—being the one out of control for a while. Being the one being led. Seonghwa is usually the one who takes care of him like this, but Yeosang doesn't mind doing it. Not when Yunho's little moans are so sweet, not when he shivers and lets Yeosang turn him over, shoving a pillow under his own hips.

Besides, all the others are occupied. It's time for just the two of them, right now.

“Yunho,” Yeosang breathes, scratching his nails down Yunho's broad, golden back. He's beautiful. His hair is dark and his eyes are closed where his cheek rests on the mattress. Yeosang grabs for his lube with one hand—under the side pillow where it always is—and the other arm braces on the mattress at the elbow to touch his fingers to Yunho's lips. Yunho moans, sucks and kisses Yeosang's fingertips, takes them all the way into his mouth when Yeosang starts to rub his slick cock between his parted cheeks, tip and shaft smoothing up and down, exerting pressure. Yunho's legs can only part so far when he's on his belly, and Yeosang knows it's torture for both of them.

“Up,” Yeosang hums, and Yunho groans but does as he's told, getting up onto his knees, still low, thighs still spread wide. “You're so needy,” Yeosang teases. “Been a while since Seonghwa's had you?”

“Just fuck me,” Yunho says around Yeosang's fingers, and Yeosang laughs, getting up and using one hand to position himself, to stay steady as he pushes forward. Yunho is tight, but he doesn't like too much prep—when he wants it he wants it, and he doesn't want to wait at all. So despite his pained little whine, Yeosang doesn't stop. Not until he's balls-deep, not until Yunho is all but shaking under him, the blankets falling away to let warm air sweep over their bodies.

“Yeosang,” Yunho gasps, and Yeosang hums, getting up a little further, having to bend to rake his nails up the insides of Yunho's thighs but it's worth it for the way he jerks, tightens and buries his face into his arms and the bed, arms stretched up the mattress, hands clenching in the sheets.

Yeosang doesn't really _thrust. _He just rolls his hips forward and up, back and down. There's no slap of skin, no obscene words. Just soft breathing, moans caught by skin and sheets. Just Yeosang bending forward and pulling Yunho back, tucked up so close that Yunho's cock is resting against his thighs, his legs spread so wide he might just pop his hips out of place. Yeosang is small enough that Yunho can do that, can rest against him like that, can fuck himself, more than Yeosang actively fucks him. It's beautiful, really. Watching Yunho struggle to get the leverage when his knees aren't quite touching the bed and he has nothing to brace his feet against. Listening to him whimper every time he _does _get what he wants, the push and slide at an angle that makes his entire body shake, makes his cock pulse and drip on Yeosang's thighs.

In the end, when Yunho is close so close but can't get himself there, he moans for Yeosang to please please please touch him, because he can't, he's so close but he can't—

Yeosang reaches between his own thighs and Yunho's belly with two slick hands, holding Yunho's cock as Yunho thrusts and shakes and jerks and cums in a hot spill over Yeosang's skin, thighs and calves clenching around Yeosang's legs, fingers tearing the fitted sheet from the mattress, face hidden by his biceps.

It's so, so beautiful. All of Yunho's muscles stand out in stark definition. He clenches so tightly that Yeosang can see it when he sits up, can feel and see the squeeze as he yanks Yunho back and gets up high on his knees to thrust twice, three times, then bury himself _deep _with a grunt, just staying there, quivering in time with Yunho's pleasure before he lets them both down onto their sides, lets Yunho be his little spoon.

Yeosang kisses the back of Yunho's sweaty neck, licks it, tastes salt and clean skin. It's different to being with any of the others, because Yunho _does _sweat, he pants because he _needs_ the air. Yeosang hugs Yunho to him, wiggles until the tops of his thighs are pressed to the back of Yunho's and his arm is around Yunho's waist, their fingers tangled. His other arm is under Yunho's neck, bent up so he can play with Yunho's hair. He'll have a numb arm later, but he doesn't really care. It'll fade.

They hear Jongho, San and Mingi come back, shouting and crowing in triumph with no doubt some kind of reptile that makes Seonghwa shriek in agitation and anger. They hear laughter, loud and high and bright—Hongjoong—and the muffled demands and threats that they _put that thing back where they found it or so help me I'll make sure you—_

“Yeosang?” Yunho says, after a long time has passed and they're still alone in the quiet of Yunho's bedroom, enjoying the warmth and the silence and one another's presence, as they usually do after they are intimate in any way.

“Mm?”

“I love you.” There is a pause, during which Yeosang feels as though he dies and wakes several times. “I mean it. I love you. The others, too. I feel like... There was a space here, and you were meant to fill it. To become...” Yeosang feels wetness on his arm—Yunho's tears dropping quietly down the side of his face. Yeosang presses closer, his lips to Yunho's hair and neck.

“To become part of the reason to live.”

Yeosang hesitates, trying to think of what to say in response to that, something so big, so warm and so very, very true. He's been frightened to put a name on it, it hasn't been long, but Yunho apparently doesn't share his reservations.

Or perhaps he does.

“God _say something,_” Yunho whispers, bringing his hand to his face, Yeosang can feel it. “Please don't—don't just—”

“I think you're right,” Yeosang says, tightening his arm on Yunho's waist, tightening their tangled fingers. “I think you're right, Yunho. It's not... It's not just you. I love you. All of them. You're all so very precious to me.” Yeosang pauses, smiling.

“Hongbin sent me here because he knew we were meant to be here. With you, with the others. Because we're meant to be one another's family, since... Since none of us have one, anymore.” It all feels inevitable. It's felt inevitable since they came here. Like they would have found their way to one another eventually anyway, and Hongbin had just... Expedited the process for them.

Yunho turns in Yeosang's arms—Yeosang has long since softened and slipped out, despite their close position—and hugs him, kisses him, soft and tear-wet. Yeosang returns those kisses, fingers in Yunho's soft hair. They kiss for a very long time, until the sun is starting to paint the morning sky. Yunho can't stay awake any longer.

Yeosang tucks him into bed, grants him a kiss on the forehead. He takes a quick shower then heads out to find Seonghwa sitting at the kitchen table, looking frazzled as Hongjoong rubs at his shoulders.

“Are you all right?” Yeosang asks. Seonghwa puts his face in his hands and sighs with his whole body and Hongjoong laughs, and laughs, and laughs.


	31. Chapter 31

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and here she is, the mark of the end of this 'arc' in the story! i can't promise any regularly scheduled progress after this, but i hope you've enjoyed the ride and don't worry; the boys will be back!

Jaehwan is already in the downstairs of his shop, so he feels the magic before he sees or smells it. Like when Yeosang had brought Hongjoong the first time, the source of the magic is coming closer and closer and it is so powerful it nearly echoes in Jaehwan's blood but unlike Hongjoong—

Unlike Hongjoong, Jahwan knows this magic. Knows its intimate pulse, knows its taste and color and consistency. He is already out from behind the counter when the front door swings open and Lee Hongbin falls to the floor, coughing viciously, gasping for air, his mouth and the floorboards covered in his honeygold blood. He tries to drag himself forward, his legs limp and useless behind him, fingernails breaking against the polished wood.

The magic behind him is terrifying.

Jaehwan throws an open palm to the door as he hauls Hongbin further inside, gasping as the door slams closed in the face of whatever is chasing Hongbin. He is limp in Jaehwan's arms, bleeding from the nose, mouth, eyes and ears. His eyes, which Jaehwan had last seen as a dull and lifeless brown, are a pale, shimmering yellow—like the rising sun on the ocean, as Gongchan used to say—as they stare out at nothing.

“Hongbin,” Jaehwan whispers, shaking him, feeling his own orange calcite colored blood turning to ice in his veins. “Hongbin. Love. Hongbin wake—wake up—”

The magic batters against the door, the force behind it ferocious. Jaehwan struggles back, trying to hold on to Hongbin's dead wight and make it to the counter. The magic is screaming, howling, vibrating the glass and the wood and Jaehwan's entire being—this is _his _shop, his place, and the magic is attacking him, directly.

Jaehwan falls back against the counter and collapses. He gets Hongbin up against his chest and tries not to wince as Hongbin coughs up a mouthful of shimmering golden yellow all over his white shirt. He just clutches him close as the world around them shakes until the shaking makes them come apart at the seams. Until his heart isn't able to beat, the force is too much. All there is is the vibration, the echo and the scream it it trying to tear down the walls of his haven.

Then it stops, the assault paused, for now, and Lee Jaehwan sits there on the floor of his shop, bleeding glittering orange from his eyes, nose, mouth and ears, and staring down at Lee Hongbin's open, unseeing eyes.

“No,” he whispers, cupping Hongbin's face. “No, love please, it's not—it's not supposed to be like this, lover please—” He can feel his own tears, but they don't seem real. Nothing feels real. Not Hongbin, who he hasn't seen in person in years, not the sight of their blood pooling together on the floor like the sun exploding. Not the violent shudder in the back of his mind that tells him something else is coming, someone else. That this is just the precursor.

That this is his own fault for leaving Hongbin to his own devices in New York all those years ago when he knows _damned well _that he should have forced Hongbin to leave, to come with him. Hunters have long memories, and even longer lists of allies. Even if the two of them had lost Gongchan, they should have tried harder—Taekwoon had told them, and they hadn't listened—

_There will come a time when you regret this, Jaehwan. _

_I regret it now, _Jaehwan had said, bitterly.

_Aah. But now, it is not yet too late. _

It can't be too late, it can't—it can't be too late. They're supposed to have more time—it's not supposed to be like this—

“Hongbin,” Jaehwan says, hearing his voice crack. “Hongb—Hongbin, lover, please don't—don't do this, you need to wake up—” But Hongbin isn't moving, isn't breathing, and his eyes are lifeless, any spark of his ferocious spirit ripped away. Jaehwan shakes his head, shakes his head and holds Hongbin to him as though to will his life force into Hongbin's dead body.

“You can't leave,” he pants, staring at the floor, unseeing. The magic around them, burning orange and white and yellow-gold with only the barest traces of a memory of plum violet (_We're like a sunset,_ Gongchan used to say, used to say, used to say,) is swirling and violent, ripping books from shelves, smashing jars of herbs, all of the hanging bells are ringing, all the windchimes are screaming, the entire world inside the shop is in vicious turmoil. “You can't _leave me—_Hongbin—”

Jaehwan screams.

Some witches are born with what witches call 'gifts' and others call 'curses.' Jaehwan has the curse of Voice; it is a very singular curse. It allows him to speak into being, at the cost of something of his own, something else. It also allows him to speak into un-being, at the gain of something else. It allows him to give and take, and it is a curse he does not use because it would be easy to live eternally, taking life force and magic and years of being here and there without the people who come into his shop being any the wiser. But now?

Now, Jaehwan screams into the void of ether with all the strength he has to find Hongbin, because his body is here, and his soul is not long gone. Jaehwan screams and screams and screams and on the other side of the world, Jung Taekwoon wakes clutching his chest, sobbing for air as twilight violet blood drips from his nose, his lips, ears and eyes. Beside him in their bed, Kim Wonsik bleeds shattered ruby red as he chokes, and Cha Hakyeon bleeds horizon line blue as he scrambles to turn on a light.

Somewhere near to none of them, a young man wakes up at his desk to find himself bleeding jungle, jewel-tone green all over the pages of a book titled, _Ghosts of New Orleans._

Hongbin chokes on goldenrod blood and in New York City, those that didn't heed Lee Hongbin's warning of impending attack, the incoming and unavoidable threat, are burning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> remember when i told you all that you should be worried about hongbin? does anyone remember that?


End file.
